Will Lankshear has nine Middlesbrough league goals – what is behind the former Tottenham striker’s rise?

The 21-year-old has quickly become central to Boro’s attack. His shot numbers and recent goals offer encouragement, while Kim Hellberg faces a careful balancing act.

Will Lankshear needed 16 minutes to underline his importance to Middlesbrough against Cardiff.

Introduced at half-time with Boro two goals down, he curled in their equaliser after Tommy Conway had started the recovery. A difficult afternoon ended with a 2-2 draw at the Riverside.

It was an effective response to being rested. It also illustrated the problem facing Kim Hellberg: how to protect a young striker who is becoming increasingly difficult to leave out.

Lankshear’s permanent departure from Tottenham in July has attracted plenty of attention. For Middlesbrough, the more useful question is how much of this start they can sustain.

What do Will Lankshear’s numbers tell us?

FotMob’s Championship figures show a striker finishing above expectation while also receiving a substantial supply of chances.

Measure	2026/27 Championship
Appearances	11
Starts	10
Minutes	886
Goals	9
Expected goals	7.12
Shots	37
Shots inside the penalty area	30

Source: FotMob, checked 21 October 2026. League matches only.

That works out at 0.91 goals and 0.72 expected goals per 90 minutes. Around 81 per cent of his attempts have come inside the box.

Expected goals estimates the quality of shooting opportunities. Lankshear has scored almost two goals more than his chances would suggest, so maintaining his current scoring rate is far from assured.

The encouragement is the volume and location of those chances. Boro have reasons to believe he can remain productive even if his finishing becomes less clinical.

Different routes to goal

His winner against Wolves on 10 October showed the value of having a centre-forward attacking a cross. As Wolves’ own report records, Lankshear rose above Hugo Bueno at the far post to head past José Sá.

Against West Brom in August, he was alert to a different opportunity. With the scores level, Kyle Joseph’s angled shot was saved and Lankshear converted the rebound to restore Boro’s lead.

That was his second goal in a 3-1 victory. His opener had been controversial because he was offside when the initial shot was struck, a reminder that individual goals can contain good fortune as well as good finishing.

The Cardiff equaliser came from further out, with Lankshear finding the bottom corner from the edge of the area.

Taken together, those examples show several ways Boro can find him: a cross to attack, a loose ball after a save or a pass that gives him room to shoot. Keeping that supply varied matters when opponents begin paying him closer attention.

Tottenham experience gave him a starting point

Lankshear arrived with a substantial grounding in senior football.

Tottenham’s announcement of his departure recorded six first-team appearances for Spurs, alongside Championship loans at West Brom and Oxford United. He scored 11 league goals for Oxford last season.

He had also been the leading scorer in Spurs’ Premier League 2 title-winning side of 2023/24 and won the competition’s player-of-the-season award.

There was clear promise before Middlesbrough signed him. The present challenge is turning that development into sustained output across a demanding league campaign.

His progress will inevitably invite questions about Tottenham’s decision to sell. It cannot establish how he would have performed with different opportunities in the Premier League.

Why Hellberg still needs to rest him

The Cardiff comeback made Hellberg’s starting selection an obvious talking point, but the manager’s explanation deserves consideration.

“He’s been absolutely brilliant and sometimes you need to also protect him,” Hellberg said in his post-match comments reported by Sky Sports.

Hellberg pointed to Lankshear’s disrupted pre-season and the need to manage players through the Championship schedule.

There is a footballing reason for that caution. A striker who can attack the next cross or react first to a rebound needs to retain the sharpness that makes those moments possible.

Boro’s task is to keep supplying Lankshear while giving him enough recovery time to make use of those opportunities. His start has made both parts of that job more important.