It's Safety First For Luke
LUKE YOUNG wants Boro to make sure of Premier League safety as soon as possible and put what he described as a "bitterly frustrating" season for the club behind them.
The England defender says the players were deeply disappointed after Saturday's sickening late defeat at Sunderland - but he knows there's no time to dwell on that now.
"We have to pick ourselves up straight away and be strong as a side and as a squad, because there are two massive games coming up for us," he said.
"We didn't want it to go this far - we wanted to push on and try to win this mini league at the bottom - but we're not going to do that now. We've got to make sure we keep ourselves in this division."
Young says Boro have no excuses for their failure to put their drop fears to bed long before now.
"It goes back to Reading, if we've won that we'd have been ten points clear of the drop zone," he said. "It was in our own hands and we've got no-one to blame but ourselves."
The 28-year-old admitted the away dressing room was a depressing place to be after the final whistle.
He said: "They were as down as I've seen anybody. We'd come back and looked like we'd nicked something and it was a cruel blow at the end.
"It's the second time in a couple of weeks we've conceded on a corner from a similar position, so that's something we need to look at.
"Everyone's hurting but it's no good to keep saying we tried hard and we did okay, we've got to start picking up wins.
"After scoring early it's so disappointing but it sums us up to let them back in again so quickly.
"From that minute on we were a yard off the pace and they seemed to want the headers and the tackles that bit more.
"A few things were said at half-time and we came out in the second half and gave it a right good go but in the end we fell short."
Boro now face Portsmouth on Saturday and Manchester City a week on Sunday knowing they still need a win to guarantee an 11th successive Premier League campaign at the Riverside.
And although Pompey may have one eye on the FA Cup final while City have slumped dramatically in the second half of the season, Young says it's all about Boro.
"It doesn't really matter what they're fighting for, we have to be professional and good enough to win this type of games at home," he said.
"There will be added pressure on us now but we need to stand strong and perhaps show a little bit more than we have in recent games.
"I just want to get safe and move on to next season because it's been bitterly frustrating this year.
"We need to keep ourselves safe and start off next season a lot better than we did this time."
