It looks like Boro are going to have to get promoted the hard way, says George Friend.
Boro slipped from top to fourth with a stinging 2-0 defeat at Watford on Monday as the fast and furious trading of the cut-throat Championship’s top two spots intensified. Now they need to make up a two-point gap in the final five fixtures to grab an automatic promotion place.
But, says the classy left-back, Boro believe they can do it.
“Yes it looks like we’ll have to do it the hard way,” he explained. “But then, there’s no easy way in this division.
“There’s been a few teams who have romped it over the years but this season was never going to be like that. We knew that from the start.
“The quality in the Championship this year has been really high. There’s a lot of teams who have really improved this season and that has made it made it much tougher for any one team to stand out and take the league by the throat.
“We knew that it would be difficult to do that and that we just had to get into the pack and stay there and give ourselves the best possible chance.”
Boro have four times hit the summit, three times having to share it with rivals and only once, last week, taking charge as solo leaders but each time they have slipped back.
“It is not just us who done that though,” said Friend.
“It does seem that whichever team gets to the top then have that little wobble.
“But if you are at the top you can only go down and when there are so many teams snapping at your heels behind you, even getting a draw means that one of the others will overtake.
“That has been the way for weeks now, months now, and it might be very entertaining for the neutrals but maybe not so much for the fans or for us.”
But the important thing is being in one of the top two chairs when the music stops says Friend, who turned in a man of the match display in the Vicarage Road setback.
“We’ve been top and slipped back but so has everyone else,” he explained. “No-one has been able to pull away.
“And that means we still have a great chance to get a top two place. We may have dropped back a bit after Watford but it is where you are at the end of the season that matters.
“And we believe it still attainable for us. It might go down to the wire but we believe we can still get there.”
Boro now have two home games as lowly Rotherham then play-off hopefuls Wolves visit the Riverside while the three teams above them all have back-to-back away trips.
“We missed a great opportunity at Watford and we were all bitterly disappointed but we have to stay positive and fight to get back to the top of the table,” he said. “We have two home games now and we have got to be looking to pick up six points and of course I think we can do that.
“If we can do that then you hope someone drops points elsewhere and that can open the door again.
“It didn’t happen for us at Watford but we can’t get too disheartened about it. That’s not going to help us.
“We are a very good team and we’ve shown that. Now we’ve got to stick together and be at our very best through these last few games. “The manager has been fantastic for us all season and I know he’ll get everyone together and fully focused.”
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