Stewart Downing is perhaps the greatest Middlesbrough academy product of all time.
The ex-England winger made over 400 appearances for Boro during his career, scoring 32 goals and providing 55 assists.
It’s been nine years since Middlesbrough last played in the Premier League, but they are currently on track to return to England’s top flight next season.
The North East club currently sits second in the EFL Championship, five points off league leaders Coventry City.
Their promotion charge is being spearheaded by another academy product who will hope to go down as one of Boro’s greatest homegrown talents: Hayden Hackney (178cm/5’10”, 70kg/154lbs).
The former England U21 international has started all of Boro’s 35 Championship games so far this term, accumulating the most minutes of any outfield player for Kim Hellberg’s side.
Should Boro earn promotion, Hayden Hackney looks likely to remain at the Riverside Stadium and play a key role in that subsequent 2026/2027 Premier League campaign, given his importance to their impressive 2025/2026 campaign thus far.
However, reports are already circulating about interest from the likes of Everton, Tottenham Hotspur, and even Manchester United in acquiring the 23-year-old central midfielder’s services, which could become a lot more doable should Boro fail to achieve promotion come the end of 2025/2026.
This Hayden Hackney scout report and player analysis shares insight into Hayden Hackney’s style of play.
Our analysis outlines the right-footer’s role within Kim Hellberg’s Middlesbrough tactics, details the midfielder’s key strengths and discusses some areas for improvement.
Hayden Hackney Stats
Figure 1 presents key 2025/2026 data on Hayden Hackney, including a heat map, position map, and percentile ranks for custom-built metrics derived from weighted combinations of Wyscout’s raw data.
Kim Hellberg has primarily set Middlesbrough up in a 4-2-3-1 or 4-4-2 this season, deploying his side in one of those two formations in almost half of their league games.
Within that setup, Hayden Hackney occupies one of the two central midfield positions.
The percentile ranks shown benchmark Hayden Hackney’s performance in each of our nine metrics against that of other central midfielders who have played at least 600 minutes in England’s second-tier and leagues deemed to be of similar quality (the Belgian Pro League, the Dutch Eredivisie, the Portuguese Primeira Liga and the Turkish Süper Lig) this season.
The data paints a picture of Hackney as a possession-dominant, progression-focused central midfielder whose main value lies in his contribution with the ball, as opposed to what he offers out of possession.
Kim Hellberg’s system and Hayden Hackney’s role within it has undoubtedly set Hackney up for success this term.
Middlesbrough are the most ball-dominant team in the Championship this term, with an average of 57.7% possession.
Hackney’s role in the team often sees him dropping deep to receive in the build-up and ball progression phases.
Middlesbrough are happy to invite high pressure when building out from the back, and Hayden Hackney suits that mindset to a tee, given his incredibly press-resistant nature.
Hackney offers his team tempo control and line-breaking carries.
He suits a team comfortable circulating possession in deeper areas and aiming to break lines via the centre of the pitch; he wouldn’t suit very direct or transition-heavy systems.
Hayden Hackney Percentile Ranks 2025/2026
Looking at the percentile ranks above, Hayden Hackney posts elite numbers across our Ball Retention Index, Progressive Distribution Score, Final Third Access Score, and Press Resistance Score, ranking in or around the top 10% of the dataset in each metric.
This is indicative of a midfielder who’s happy to get heavily involved in build-up and ball progression, as well as highly capable of escaping pressure, maintaining control in central areas, and progressing his side upfield consistently, which are all highly valuable traits in possession-oriented systems.
It’s important to note that Hackney doesn’t just recycle possession, he looks to play a meaningful role in ball progression.
Hackney’s middling score in Verticality Index indicates a degree of balance in his decision-making, with forward intent measured, not forced.
Out of possession, we see Hackney’s profile become much less dominant.
All of our defensive metrics point to below-average performance from Hayden Hackney.
This doesn’t necessarily imply a lack of work rate, but it does highlight that defensive disruption isn’t the foundation of Hackney’s game and isn’t what he should primarily be tasked with or judged on.
Hayden Hackney contributes less through anticipation and ball-winning but more through structural control in possession.
His Normalised Attacking Efficiency Score also sits relatively low, suggesting that while he plays a key role in progression and final-third access, he’s not heavily responsible for end-product.
This can be interpreted as his influence coming earlier in attacking sequences rather than in the final action.
Hayden Hackney Ball Progression
Video analysis of Hayden Hackney’s game further helps us to contextualise and understand what the data points out.
The clip below encapsulates a lot of the biggest strengths in Hayden Hackney’s game.
First, we see Hayden Hackney move into space and make himself a good passing option for his centre-backs to break the first line of pressure.
He scans responsibly before receiving, preparing himself well to receive on the half-turn and begin his progressive carry.
Notably, Hayden Hackney has made the most progressive carries (4.15 per 90) of any midfielder in England’s second-tier this season.
He evades tackles well while carrying forward before playing a beautiful through pass into the final third, which is somewhat disguised by his body positioning before releasing the ball.
Hackney’s decision-making under pressure is a fantastic asset for Middlesbrough’s attack, which has played a key role in putting them in the exciting position they find themselves in at the business end of the season.
The next clip above shows another great example of Hayden Hackney’s ability to disguise his intended pass, thus helping his team progress into the opposing box.
In addition to providing another solid example of Hayden Hackney’s vision, the clip above shows how the midfielder is happy to roam away from the centre and into wide areas when necessary.
The clip above shows Hackney popping up on the right, while in the clip below, Hackney appears on the left riding challenges, breaking lines, and helping his team advance into the final third.
Hayden Hackney is often found roaming about when his team is in possession in the opposition’s half, searching for the place from where he can influence the game the most for his side.
In Figure 2, we see Hayden Hackney has advanced to the right half-space to support his team in the final third.
After receiving, Hackney spots an opportunity to slice the opposition’s defence open for the right-back’s incisive run.
This leads to a great opportunity for Middlesbrough to create a goalscoring chance.
Hayden Hackney Areas For Improvement
While we don’t anticipate that Hayden Hackney will ever be N’Golo Kanté, nor should he try to be, it wouldn’t hurt the young midfielder or his coaches to place a bit of emphasis on improving his anticipation of opposing passing lanes and his ability to engage proactively and effectively without the ball.
Based on his current trajectory and performance level, Hayden Hackney appears well-positioned to make the step up to the Premier League in the near future.
However, once he makes the jump to the next level, teams will certainly target him more in transition and try to exploit his weakness at protecting central zones without the ball.
Therefore, he’ll need to become at least average at defending with his brain and positioning, enabling him to intercept the ball more often and remove that clear weakness from his game, which could get in the way of consistent top-flight minutes.
Given his strength in carrying the ball forward from deep, a training ground emphasis should also be placed on the speed of Hayden Hackney’s reactions when possession is lost, and he should become more aggressive in counterpressing and intelligently blocking passing lanes once the turnover occurs.
Lastly, no midfielder is going to put just the right weight on every pass.
Still, Hackney does play his through passes with a bit too much strength, a little too often, so some refinement in that area will enable him and his team to better exploit his outstanding vision and passing, as outlined above.
Conclusion
In possession, though the 23-year-old still has room to improve in certain areas, I’d say Hayden Hackney has passed the EFL Championship challenge, and his 2025/2026 campaign warrants a move to the next level.
However, players and coaches will almost certainly target the outlined weaknesses in his transitional and out-of-possession game very effectively and ruthlessly once that next step is taken, so a combination of the right system which protects Hayden Hackney’s weaknesses in that area along with coaching to develop that defensive and defensive transition side of his game will be absolutely necessary if he’s to enjoy a sustained period at Premier League level.
I’d say the central midfield role in a 4-4-2/4-2-3-1 system, such as the one Kim Hellberg is employing this term, is the best possible role for Hayden Hackney, as it allows him to drop deep and participate in build-up and ball progression, making use of his press resistance, ball-carrying, and progressive passing quality.
A high-volume defensive midfield partner who’s happy to play a disciplined, ball-winning role is a necessity in order to avail of Hayden Hackney’s strengths without being severely punished on the other side of the ball right now.
So, while I’m a big fan of this player, there are clear areas in which he must make progress in order to become a reliable Premier League-level midfielder.
His talent warrants a platform at the biggest stage, but he’ll only get there if he can ensure that his defensive and transitional limitations do not outweigh his possession strengths at a higher tempo.
