Middlesbrough are well-placed after 23 games of the Championship campaign
Middlesbrough’s Callum Brittain (l), Luke Ayling and Alan Browne celebrate(Image: Alex Dodd/Shutterstock)
Middlesbrough’s draw with Blackburn Rovers officially took us to the halfway stage of the Championship season – and if the past five seasons are anything to go by, Boro have strong promotion chances.
In only picking up a point against Rovers in a disappointing performance at the Riverside, Boro allowed league leaders Coventry City to extend their lead at the top of the Championship.
But with third and fourth-placed Ipswich Town and Hull City only managing draws of their own, Boro remained five points clear in the second automatic promotion place and will be guaranteed to head into the new year in second place, regardless of how they get on when they host Hull on Monday evening in their final game of the calendar year.
In terms of Boro’s promotion prospects, recent history suggests Kim Hellberg’s side are well-placed to achieve promotion this season.
Only one of the last ten teams to occupy a top-two spot at the halfway point of the season have failed to achieve promotion. Eight of the nine who have achieved promotion did so automatically too.
Brentford sat second after 23 games in 2020-21 but a resurgent Watford moved from sixth to second in the second half of the season. The Bees still managed to secure third place though and won promotion via the play-offs.
As for the only side who haven’t achieved promotion when sitting second at this stage of the season, that dishonour befalls Chris Wilder’s Sheffield United last season.
In what was effectively a three-horse race last term, Burnley, Leeds and the Blades pulled away from the pack and Wilder’s side were incredibly unfortunate to accumulate 92 points but miss out on second place as Burnley and Leeds won promotion with 100 points apiece.
Sheffield United finished third and made it to the play-off final. However, they were then beaten by Sunderland at Wembley, as the Wearsiders secured promotion and have made an excellent start this term as they try to buck the trend of promoted clubs being instantly relegated.
As Boro’s points tally at the half way stage, their point against Blackburn means they have 43 points now, just three shy of a two-points-per-game average.
The slight concern would be that only Bournemouth and Watford of the ten automatically promoted teams in the last five seasons had fewer points at the halfway mark.
Nevertheless, to further boost Boro’s promotion hopes, the last seven Boro teams that sat in the top two of the league on Christmas Day, as Kim Hellberg’s side did this year, all went on to achieve promotion.
History appears to be on Boro’s side and will hopefully repeat itself this term. Nevertheless, there is still plenty of work to be done, and Boro will know they have to be so much better than they were on Friday if they are to retain their automatic promotion spot.
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