Middlesbrough 1 Brighton 1: Relief as the Boro complete seven-year odyssey

A thoroughly intoxicating but emotionally exhausting afternoon by the Tees left Middlesbrough players and staff – and a fair few fans besides – craving sleep as opposed to party lights after completing not just a 46-game season, but an epic crusade.

Boro’s road back to the Premier League after a seven-year absence was a long and winding one and the journey was at times hazardous.

In keeping with a tumultuous helter-skelter season, the Teessiders were afforded no respite until the shrill of Mike Dean’s whistle after eight minutes of stoppage-time signalled an on-pitch explosion of joy and a mass outpouring of sheer relief.

Hanging on by their fingertips following an oppressive and at times thoroughly fraught second half after Dale Stephens’s 55th-minute header cancelled out Cristhian Stuani’s opener, Boro chiselled out the draw they required to ensure Yorkshire’s representation back in the big time. It was never meant to be easy, was it?

For coach Aitor Karanka, the sense of redemption following the bitter pill of play-off final despair at Wembley just a year ago, was clear to see with his emotional embrace with his parents and family members on the pitch following the final whistle being a truly special moment.

For local lads such as Stewart Downing and Ben Gibson, not to mention his uncle Steve – the ubiquitous Boro chairman – there was peace at long last.

Karanka openly admitted that he had endured a sleep-deprived week in the build-up to a game which brought with it the golden ticket of £170m for the victors or the dice roll of the play-offs for the vanquished.

After beating Brighton in the reverse fixture on the south coast, Boro may have been afforded the perfect present for Christmas by virtue of the Championship leadership.

But it was nothing compared to the prize they claimed on a murky old Teesside Spring afternoon when the sun at least shone metaphorically on the hosts.

For Oxford 1967, Newcastle 1990, Wolves 1992, Oxford (again) 1998, read Brighton 2016.

All of the aforementioned end-of-season episodes – when Boro either clinched promotion or saved themselves from relegation – had gone down in club folklore, as will Saturday’s events.

A true ‘where were you?’ moment.

Downing, who might as well have been speaking for the whole of Teesside, said: “I didn’t sleep a wink last night (Friday), possibly an hour I think.

“I am absolutely flat out, I only played 30 or 40 minutes, but I am absolutely out on my feet. This is the best moment in my career. I’m so pleased for the chairman out of everyone because of the amount of money he has put in.

“He’s the sole factor why I came back here so nobody deserves it more than him. We’re Middlesbrough, we don’t make it easy...”

Leicester City may have been the talk of the country ahead of their Premier League coronation, but mention of the East Midlands club ahead of the game will have provoked dark memories from those of a red and white persuasion.

In May, 1988, Bruce Rioch’s Boro famously hosted the Foxes at the old Ayresome Park, needing a win or a draw to book a top-flight return, with the paralells on Saturday being plain to see.

In the event, Boro blew it across town en route to a shattering 2-1 loss and were consigned to the play-off lottery. Not again, surely... Not this time.

In keeping with the Leicester theme during Saturday’s final Riverside throes, seasoned and scarred home fans could not have also failed to turn their thoughts to that moment at Wembley in 1997, when a cruel last-gasp goal from Emile Heskey ensured that Boro’s wait for their first piece of major silverware would go on when he netted the equaliser in the League Cup final.

Given the epic length of stoppage time on Saturday, it looked nailed-on that some similar element of drama would transpire.

But relief was ultimately at hand, with Dimi Konstantopoulos’s gathering of a cross in the last minute leading to a collective puffing out of cheeks by all those in red in the 33,806 crowd ahead of the final whistle moments later.

The first half may have gone to script, with Karanka’s pre-match calls to promote Stuani and David Nugent ahead of Downing and Jordan Rhodes vindicated by virtue of the pair combining for a close-range opener after Ramirez’s beautifully-flighted free-kick. The only downside for the hosts at the break was the scoreline. On another afternoon, the outcome may have been sealed by half-time but that is plainly not the Boro way.

A brilliant block from Connor Goldson denied Stuani a second and Ramirez was inches away with a lob, with the second half tortuous in comparison.

Stephens’s looping back-post header from Anthony Knockaert’s free-kick restored parity and despite his dismissal soon after following a high challenge on Ramirez – stretchered off after lengthy treatment to a nasty wound in his leg – it only prolonged the anguish for Boro in an intolerable final half-hour.

It was Brighton, cool, calm and collected on the ball, who looked like the side with the extra man, with the hosts looking sapped of strength and running on the equivalent of petrol fumes.

It was long and painful, but Boro’s famed defensive resolve somehow hauled them over the line and defender and proud Teessider Gibson added: “It is a dream. It’s been the longest week, in fact it’s been the longest seven years. It means so much to the town.

“I read something on Friday that talked about putting us back on the map and we’ve certainly done that and that is what is important, it is a great town full of great people and it’s the least we deserve. We have gone through a lot of hard times and this is a just reward.”