NEIL Warnock surpassed a remarkable footballing record on Tuesday night. While it wasn't a night to remember from a results perspective, the Boro boss has been open and honest about what's kept him going for all these years.

That's his relationship with the fans and providing that winning feeling.

1,602 games in English Football were chalked off, beating Dario Gradi's record, at Kenilworth Road earlier this week but it wasn't a night to remember. Boro were dismantled at the hands of Luton Town losing 3-1 in Hertfordshire after conceding three goals in five second half minutes.

After three consecutive wins before the weekend, Boro have now endured back-to-back defeats which has seen them slip out of the Championship play-offs.

It's so far been a hard week for Warnock and his men and they've got the mighty task of facing West Brom at the weekend. But over the course of his long and distinguished career, he will have gone through harder times.

He's often joked that this could be his last season in management having retired from the game six times. Since his first ever season as a manager in charge of Gainsborough Trinity in 1980, he says winning still invokes the same feeling to this day.

The 72-year-old said: “I wouldn’t be in it now at my age with the games and everything if it didn’t mean everything to me.

“I would say between 2-3pm on a matchday, an hour before kick-off, the feeling in my guts is horrible really. As soon as the last game of the season, I never get that again.

“A few years ago, I started taking sleeping tablets usually on the night before a match. But then after the last game of the season, I never took a sleeping tablet until the first game of the following season.

“It is a difficult job. We get paid well don’t we. But I don’t think it’s the money, I think it’s the satisfaction you get when you win a game and that whistle goes.

“There’s nothing quite like it when you know you’ve sent thousands of people home happy. Little kids with their flags and that and their dads. I think it’s just an amazing game.

“That’s the part I’ll miss. I’ll miss having banter before the games signing autographs and pictures with the kids because everybody now, they’ve all got big earphones and gone straight in the dressing room. They don’t bother about the fans.

“My dad used to say ‘when they stop asking you, that’s time to worry son’. And it is.

“I’ll enjoy it as much as I can for the rest of the season and try and do my best because I still think we are capable of getting in that top six. But we need a bit of luck with injuries now and probably one or two faces in January.”

Boro have already earmarked potential plans for the January transfer window with Warnock targeting a physical striker and conversations set to take place amongst coaching and recruitment staff.