Playing Premier League football for Boro is where Adam Reach wants to be this time next year.
The past 12 months have seen the talented winger establish himself as a regular starter in Aitor Karanka’s first team.
Following loan spells with Shrewsbury and Bradford last season, the 21-year-old has matured into one of Boro’s most consistent performers in the Championship over the first half of the current campaign.
Looking forward to 2015, Reach is taking nothing for granted but, understandably, knows it could prove to be a hugely rewarding year if he and the club fulfil their potential.
Asked where he hoped he would be in on New Year’s Eve 2015, he said: “Hopefully, I will be playing in the Premier League with Middlesbrough.
“Every player wants to play in the Premier League because it’s the best league in the world and I’m pretty confident we can do that next year.”
Reach’s Boro future was in doubt a year ago but his performances for the club this season earned him a new, long-term contract that runs until the summer of 2019.
“That was a plus,” he admitted. “Personally I wanted to commit my future to the club and it’s nice to know the club wanted me to stay that long.
“It was a reward, really, for some good performances and, hopefully, we can kick on and the team can get rewarded at the end of the season by getting promoted.”
Reach made just three first team appearances for Boro last season, including one solitary start, so to be involved in all but one of the club’s fixtures so far this time around is a remarkable statistic.
His aim, not surprisingly, over the second half of the current campaign is to retain his regular place in the team.
“If somebody said I would play every game apart from one and that I would start so many games, I don’t think I would have laughed but I probably would have been a little bit sceptical.
“But that’s the way it’s turned out and I’m happy about that. Hopefully I can make as many appearances in the second half of the season as I have in the first. I feel very much part of the squad this season.
“Some of the players I’ve known now for two or three years and the new lads have settled in really well.
“This year we’ve got a really good changing room, we haven’t got any players who think they are better than anyone else, everyone is level-headed and I think that’s showing on the pitch away from home and at the Riverside so let’s keep it going.”
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