Despite the stoppage time heroics of his side, it wasn’t to be. Draws won’t be celebrated like wins – at least not this one – but the importance of picking up a point will never be lost on the head coach and his staff.
After Edwards and the players turned from the away end and headed for the tunnel, the head coach was in conversation with his deputies Adi Viveash and Harry Watling.
“H and Aidy both said that to me when we were walking off, we have to respect the point, especially away from home in this league,” said Boro‘s boss.
The importance of ‘respecting the point’ was stressed by Watling to supporters at the ‘Meet the Staff’ event at the Riverside back in early July when the new coaching team were settling in.
“If you’re not able to win then don’t lose,” Edwards told the media on the Deepdale pitch after Saturday’s entertaining and dramatic 2-2 draw.
This was a game Boro could have won but very nearly lost.
And it’s not just educated guess work to say Boro would have lost a game like this last season. They did. In calamitous and shambolic fashion. The chaotic late defensive mix-up between Aidan Morris, Rav van den Berg and Luke Ayling in January gifted Preston three points and very much summed up the issues that cost Michael Carrick’s side a play-off place and the former Manchester United midfielder his job.
Boro lost as many as they won last season – 18 games. Had they possessed the steel or nous to turn more of those narrow defeats into draws – which is the very least they should have got from several games they lost – their season would have stretched beyond 46 games.
Three things earned Middlesbrough a point at Deepdale on Saturday: the head coach’s willingness, not for the first time this season, to make early proactive substitutions, the strength in depth in the squad and the “really special” spirit Edwards believes is developing fast.
Boro trailed to Lewis Dobbin’s first half opener at the break and, after a below-par showing in the opening 45 minutes, it came as no surprise whatsoever to see Edwards act. David Strelec was introduced for his debut and Boro instantly improved.
It was fellow substitute Sverre Nypan who superbly set up Matt Targett’s equaliser and another substitute Sontje Hansen who bundled in the 92nd minute second leveller, with yet another substitute, Alan Browne, having done his best to claim it. Boro’s squad depth is going to be a real asset this season.
Edwards has options and dilemmas. Nypan can’t and won’t be a substitute for much longer and Strelec will be a starter. But finishers can be game-changers and points-earners for Boro this season. They were against Sheffield United before the break and and now Preston after it.
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That dramatic second equaliser, though, wasn’t so much about tactics or personnel but character. Having levelled once and pushed for the winner, how easy it would have been for Boro heads to drop after Jordan Storey headed in what looked a certain winner two minutes from time.
But that, says Edwards, will never happen on his watch.
“Even at some stage if we’re 3-0 with 92 minutes gone, we want to get the next goal and run really hard and show fight and character,” he said.
“For ourselves, for our pride, for us because that’s what you do as a professional athlete, but also for our supporters, it has to matter.
“While there’s still air in our lungs, we’ll keep fighting.”
That fight, spirit, belief is what preserved Middlesbrough’s unbeaten start and kept them top of the Championship.
And while the dressing room mood was still “tinged with slight disappointment”, the manner of the draw keeps momentum and belief building on the pitch and in the stands ahead of Friday night’s visit of West Brom.
“The table will sort itself out,” said Edwards.
“I’m not worried about that. But the character we showed is important.
“I loved the reaction from the team both times after going behind. We didn’t show disappointment, we got on with it.
“Nobody is going to give anything to anyone. Just because we’ve had a good start doesn’t mean we have a right to win games of football. You have to earn it and today we earned a point.
“We move forward and we can make it a really good point if we perform and win the next game.
“We want to win every game, but we know this is a good away point.
“The lads are happy but it’s tinged with a little bit of frustration because we wanted to win. But we know we can’t win all the time, it’s impossible. But we try to, that’s the most important thing, we really try to.”
Friday night under the lights against West Brom has the makings of being a great Riverside occasion. Come full-time, Edwards will hope he can deliver the fist pumps again.