Graeme Souness: 'It's going to be tight but it's all about keeping your nerve'

Boro legend Graeme Souness believes the teams that win promotion this season will be those that hold their nerve in the campaign climax.

With 10 fixtures remaining, it’s incredibly tight at the top of the Championship the four leading teams all on 66 points ahead of this weekend’s fixtures.

Former Scotland, Liverpool and Boro midfield general Souness knows all about winning promotion from the second tier of English football.

As a player he was a key member of Jack Charlton’s Division Two champions in 1974 and, as a manager, he guided Blackburn Rovers back into the Premier League in 2001.

Souness, now 61, doesn’t get to watch Aitor Karanka’s Boro team in the flesh very often these days but he does keep abreast of the club’s fortunes on TV and likes what he’s seen this season.

“I’ve not seen them live but I’ve seen them on the telly several times and they look to be a team that is trying to play the right way,” he told the Gazette.

Aitor Karanka

“Aitor will know what he’s doing, he’s been a big player in his day, so he will be used to pressure situations and that’s a situation they find themselves in now.

“It’s about keeping a lid on that and making sure all the energy is focused in the right direction, which I’m sure they will do.”

Souness believes Karanka’s experience of high-pressure situations as a player and a coach with Real Madrid will come in useful as the season draws to a close.

“There are other candidates, Bournemouth are a very good team, Derby are, and then coming up on the rails are Watford and Norwich,” said Souness, who made more than 200 appearances for Boro in the 1970s.

“So it’s going to be tight but it’s all about keeping your nerve and the manager has experience of big situations, winning the European Cup with Real Madrid or this, it’s the same pressure.”

Graeme Souness as a Boro player

Souness also insists the Boro fans can have a positive impact on their team’s promotion bid.

“You are coming into the home straight and the supporters are getting more nervous with every game with every game,” he said.

“The supporters have a big part to play. When things are not going as well as you hoped in the first 15-20 minutes into the game, they need to stay with them.

“But my experience of the supporters here, they do that.”

• Philip Tallentire was talking to Graeme Souness at James Cook University Hospital, in Middlesbrough. The former Boro star was helping promote the South Cleveland Heart Fund’s Cardiac MR Appeal and the launch of the Loving Hearts Raffle. Middlesbrough Erimus Rotary Club is organising a region-wide raffle that will hopefully raise up to £100,000 to help fund the upgrade of an MRI scanner at James Cook.