will be priority for international break

In that sense, while frustrating to not have a quick opportunity to put things right, the international break comes at a positive time for Boro.

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Edwards will be looking to utilise the extra training time that the international break brings, with only four first-team players away representing their countries. And recent games will have highlighted two key areas for improvement.

Finding the right attack balance

There can be no mistaking that it's in attack where Boro need to see the most improvement. Even when results were going their way, their success was built on the solid foundations at the back, more than any free-scoring exploits at the other end of the pitch.

Edwards is clear he doesn't want to lose that solidity, and for good reason.

But he concedes that he needs to find a way to get the balance between defence and attack right, because Boro didn't carry anywhere near enough of a credible goalscoring threat against either Portsmouth or Stoke City.

The opposite was true of Carrick's Boro, who were always amongst the top scorers in the Championship during his time in charge, but were also overly expansive at the back.

That was particularly problematic in games like Saturday's against Portsmouth, where despite being high scorers, they often struggled to break down low-block defences.