Championship Playoffs Winner Tip: Middlesbrough

Norwich may be touted as the favourites to go up (9/5 Skybet) but it’s Middlesbrough (12/5 Coral) who have the fondest memories of clashes with their playoff rivals this season.

Boro 4-0 Brentford
Brentford 0-1 Boro
Boro 4-0 Norwich
Norwich 0-1 Boro
Ipswich 2-0 Boro
Boro 4-1 Ipswich

As you can see, Aitor Karanka’s boys won five of their six meetings with the remaining hopefuls in 2014-15 and that can stand them in good stead when the pressure is on.

Boro begin their play-off campaign with a two-legged showdown with Brentford who suffered an aggregate 5-0 defeat to the Teessiders this season. Those are tough numbers to turnaround.

If the 2006 UEFA Cup Finalists reach Wembley they would then face one of the East Anglian sides, both of whom they also put four past at the Riverside Stadium. However, it is the 1-0 victory at Carrow Road which came only three weeks ago, which might have the greatest psychological impact were Norwich to progress.

Any way you look at it Middlesbrough boast by far the best defence in the second tier having only conceded 37 times in 46 league games and kept 21 clean sheets. Nobody else can come close to those statistics.

Furthermore, they would probably have won promotion automatically had they not been distracted by an FA Cup run which included a 2-0 victory at Manchester City. Class can prevail in the end though and see Boro back in the big time.