It has been a tumultuous couple of weeks at Middlesbrough Football Club – a poor run of form culminated in a 1-0 defeat at Neil Warnock’s Rotherham was followed by a training ground bust up between the manager Aitor Karanka, and a number of senior players, including influential winger Stewart Downing.

It ended with a tense promotion clash against Hull, one that was won by a superb injury time header from David Nugent, who was brought on by Karanka with 20 minutes left on the clock.

Despite all the internal issues at the club, Middlesbrough still lie in 3^rd place in the league, with a game in hand and are just 1 point behind 2^nd placed Brighton.

The question now is whether this victory gives Middlesbrough the impetus to finish in the top two, and whether Nugent, who is now surely in line for a starting berth against QPR on Saturday, can fire them back to the promised land.

Nugent is certainly no stranger to pressure situations.

In Leicester’s promotion winning season, Nugent was their top scorer with 20 league goals, with a fair proportion of those goals coming from the penalty spot.

He scored an incredible solo goal for Preston against Leeds in the 2005/06 Championship play-offs, and of course infamously scored on his England debut against Andorra in what proved to be his only international cap.

Arriving at the Riverside for £2 million (potentially rising to £4 million if Middlesbrough win promotion), Nugent was seen to be the answer to Middlesbrough’s call for a prolific striker, after the move of Kike had not brought immediate success and with the club wanting competition for new signing Cristhian Stuani.

Although Middlesbrough have struggled in front of goal in recent weeks, Nugent has notched up 8 league goals this season and sits top of the club’s goal scoring charts.

With the recent arrival of Jordan Rhodes, however, Nugent has found himself limited to more of a squad rotation role since February, although his late winner against Hull will certainly give him a chance of now making the starting position his own.

Nugent recently spoke to the club's official website about the ‘togetherness’ at the club following the win over Hull, suggesting that the tension built up over the past few weeks at the Riverside has now settled.

With Karanka now once again established by owner Steve Gibson as the man to take Middlesbrough forward, can his £4m summer acquisition prove his worth to be far more than that by firing his team to the Premier League?

Boro fans..... What do you think? Can Nugent fire you to the Premier League? Let us know below!