FEELING like a ‘failure’ at Wembley on Monday will drive Grant Leadbitter on to leading Middlesbrough to an automatic promotion spot next season – even though he is braced for a summer of change on Teesside.

Despite being relatively satisfied with the Middlesbrough squad which finished the season, Aitor Karanka is set for another busy close season in a bid to finalise a squad capable of sealing a Premier League return via the Championship’s top two next season.

Loan players Patrick Bamford, Kenneth Omeruo, Jelle Vossen, Ryan Fredericks and Tomas Kalas have all returned to their parent clubs and all of those could need replacing in the squad before the end of August.

Jonathan Woodgate, Dean Whitehead, Seb Hines and Emmanuel Ledesma are senior members on the Middlesbrough payroll out of contract at the end of next month. Only the first two stand a chance of staying, although Whitehead has hinted on social media this week that he has said his farewells after two years on Teesside.

So even though Middlesbrough are exploring ways of filling the gaps to try to keep ahead of the rest, it is not just simply a case of adding to the players Karanka already has at his disposal.

Leadbitter thinks it is imperative that new recruits must quickly buy into the united team ethic which the club’s Spanish head coach has installed over the last 18 months at the Riverside Stadium.

“We have to regroup and move on from Wembley as soon as we can,” said Leadbitter. “We have to keep the spirit from top to bottom throughout the club. Progress has been made, of course it has. But we have not achieved what we wanted to achieve so is it a failure? Maybe.

“But we are a good group here and we have to use this next season and make sure we are not in the same position next season. We have to go for the top two.

“We go away. We come back for pre-season and we get back to work. In football you cannot stand still. This group of players cannot stand still.

“We have to stay together and keep the dressing room together because the spirit among us is fantastic. That’s one thing that this club has got and always will have hopefully. So we move on.”

Even when Leadbitter had emerged from the dressing room on Monday, he struggled to hold back his emotions when he was asked to reflect on the defeat to Norwich City.

Despite finishing a respectable fourth in the Championship in Karanka’s first full season in charge, it was impossible to disguise the disappointments of missing out on a return to the Premier League having come so close.

Leadbitter had stood on his own behind every other member of the Middlesbrough camp as Norwich skipper Russell Martin walked up the steps to lift the play-off final trophy.

But the sight of Martin celebrating with the rest of the yellow shirts in North London on Monday will never leave the midfielder.

“It hurt. It really, really hurt,” said Leadbitter. “I suppose when you look at what went on at Wembley, after the game, seeing Norwich celebrate, you have got to use that. Monday was the worst I have felt as a footballer.

“I believe you have to use that. I believe that what I saw was a bad experience and I don’t want to have to go through it again, so I use it to push me on and make me a better footballer.

“I drive myself on but there are little things that keep you going and my thoughts are this: that it really hurt and I will do what I can to make sure what happened drives me and the team on even more. It did hurt. I wanted it to be me and Woody up there, celebrating, but it wasn’t to be.”