Chuba Akpom made a bit of Middlesbrough history on Saturday, becoming their first player to score 20 goals in a league season since the turn of the millennium.

In a dominant Middlesbrough display against Reading on Saturday, the hosts ran out 5-0 winners to strengthen their automatic promotion chances and solidify their play-off spot if they miss out on the top two.

Once again, former Gunners’ striker Chuba Akpom was at the heart of things.

The ex-Arsenal academy graduate scored a penalty in the 24th minute for Middlesbrough’s opening goal, followed by his second and Middlesbrough’s third in the 48th minute to kill the contest.

Akpom’s brace puts him clear at the top of the Championship goalscoring tally with 21 goals, four ahead of Coventry City’s Viktor Gyokeres.

But it also represents the first time since the turn of the millennium that a Middlesbrough player has scored 20 league goals in a season.

The last time a Middlesbrough player scored 20 goals in a league season was 1989/90, when Bernie Slaven bagged 21 goals in the English Second Division (now referred to as the Championship).

Adding in his FA Cup goal against Brighton, Akpom also has the most goals in all competitions of any Middlesbrough player since Fabrizio Ravanelli in 1996/97.

It’s been a quite incredible season for the 27-year-old, who has already won two PFA Championship Fans’ Player of the Month awards so far this campaign.

The striker will be focusing on Middlesbrough’s team goal of promotion to the Premier League, but he looks set to break some more records along the way.