Tony Pulis bids to join hallowed company in taking Boro into the Premier League in his first full season in charge.

Jack Charlton, Bruce Rioch, Lennie Lawrence and Bryan Robson have hit the top flight target at the first time of asking.

Big Jack and Robbo found themselves in a managerial hot seat for the first time when they took Boro up, while Rioch’s only previous English experience was as boss of Torquay United.

Hopefully Pulis can draw on his vast experience in charge of several clubs and join the Boro’s first timers.

After all, he’s been a coach a long, long time since first getting his UEFA A licence at the age of 21.

Pulis has spent much of his managerial career in the Premier League but also guided Stoke City to promotion in the past.

The key, clearly, is to build a competitive and combative side which has the mental strength to get out of the Championship.

Tony Pulis

There is money to spend, though not all previous Boro promotion-winners have improved their squad during the summer.

Jack Charlton did not spend a penny of the club’s money in shaping the side that won the Second Division by a record points margin in 1974.

His only signing was Scottish international Bobby Murdoch who arrived from Celtic on a free transfer. Not a bad bit of business.

Big Jack won promotion largely by introducing a clinical new system into a half-decent but under-achieving Boro squad which had fallen just short for several years.

He did inherit some top quality players, such as Graeme Souness, Willie Maddren and David Armstrong, but Big Jack made them believe in themselves.

Most of those same players went on to become big names in the game and enjoyed fine careers.

Perhaps the biggest thing Big Jack achieved from the supporters’ point of view was in giving Teesside back its pride.

He brought an end to the frustrations of 20 years of second tier football. Boro had been one of the game’s lesser lights for a long, long time.

In fact older fans had to go back to the days of Wilf Mannion to remember what it was like to see Boro in the First Division.

Jack Charlton led Boro to the old Second Division title in 1974
Jack Charlton led Boro to the old Second Division title in 1974

With Big Jack’s platform and a fine job afterwards from John Neal, Boro stayed up for eight productive seasons before the Second Division welcomed them back again.

Liquidation eventually followed and the Boro were almost abandoned by the Football League in 1986.

However the club survived and rose again from the ashes and was most fortunate to have Rioch in charge at the time.

Bruce was another who did not spend any money in taking the Boro to promotion. Well he couldn’t anyway. There was a spending embargo on the club.

Rioch had already performed miracles in keeping most of the players together during the summer. After all, they had been given permission by the League to talk to other clubs.

Bruce started the season with 13 players, at least a couple of whom who had never previously kicked a ball in the first team.

Turning such a small, young squad into a hotly competitive side will remain one of the top Boro achievements of all time.

Rioch didn’t only secure promotion in his first full season in charge, he doubled up with a repeat dose in the following season.

Boro went hurtling from Division Three to Division One – and they did so with a virtually unchanged squad. Marvellous stuff!

People have said that Rioch drew on everything he had been taught by his father, a regimental sergeant-major in the Scots Guards.

Rioch was certainly incredibly disciplined and he tried to instil that same mentality into his players (and in me, as a Gazette reporter) - but he never bullied the lads. He led by example.

Bruce Rioch in May 1988

Unfortunately Boro were promoted too quickly, before they could build solid foundations, and they came crashing down again.

Within three years, Boro were back up, this time the mastermind being that wily old Cockney motivator Lennie Lawrence.

Lennie pulled the rabbit out of the hat at the first attempt, which was rather special in itself as he was better known for his magic relegation avoidance tricks at Charlton.

Lawrence kept cash-strapped Athletic in the First Division for several seasons against all the odds. It earned him the nickname Houdini.

But he showed another side to his talents by putting together a Boro team good enough to march into the inaugural Premier League.

He did spend some money, making an excellent double signing from Watford in Paul Wilkinson and Willie Falconer but he didn’t need to break the bank to turn Boro into a promotion side.

Unfortunately Lawrence lost his Houdini tag in the Premier League. Boro were relegated and Lennie was to spend just one more season in charge.

This created the opening for Bryan Robson to breeze in on a wave of hyper-publicity.

Robbo did not waste any time in putting together a competitive unit. He bought the club’s first £1m player in defender Neil Cox, and made several astute additional signings, including influential centre-back Nigel Pearson and golden boots Uwe Fuchs.

Bryan Robson

Robbo, with 461 games for Manchester United under his belt, also played a bit himself and provided a guiding light on the pitch.

Under Robbo, Boro always looked likely to go up and did so in time to launch a new era at the freshly built Riverside Stadium.

Some marvellous moments followed - including a promotion repeat under Robbo.

Boro were relegated in 1997 as a result of the three-points fiasco and lost superstars like Fabrizio Ravanelli and Juninho.

Robbo responded by bringing in the mercurial Paul Merson and the team played some wonderful attacking football en route to another famous promotion.

Captain Fantastic Tony Mowbray rejoined the club as gaffer and threatened to add his name to the list of promotion first timers when top of the Championship by the end of December, 2012 but the team lost steam and eventually fell away.

Then Aitor Karanka followed up by taking Boro into the play-offs in his first full season in charge.

The Spaniard made gradual changes to the squad, arguably the most notable of which was the loan signing of Patrick Bamford from Chelsea.

Bamford top scored with 19 goals but was injured late in the season which stuttered and Boro lost in the play-off final.

Rewind to before the aforementioned and there was another popular boss who engineered a notable first time promotion.

That is a fine list of achievements from some well respected bosses, all hard acts to follow but all successful in their first full campaign at Boro. Over to you Tony!