TONY PULIS will not let criticism get to him as he looks to get Middlesbrough’s promotion charge back on track, and has urged his players to stay confident in their ability too.

Boro head for Reading this afternoon without a win in five matches and pressure has started to grow on his shoulders after the midweek defeat to League One’s Burton Albion in the Carabao Cup quarter-final.

Middlesbrough don’t look like they believe in themselves going forward and Pulis has regularly admitted that he is on the look out for new recruits in the January window that can boost his team’s attacking output.

Pulis is an experienced manager and he knows only too well that there has been criticism of his style of play after days leading Stoke City and West Bromwich Albion in the Premier League. He is also, though, known for achieving results.

Speaking at Boro’s Rockliffe Park training base yesterday morning, Pulis said: “You have to accept that. The whole situation of being in football management now, if you want to be in football management then you can’t have thin skin.

“You’ve got to be tough and you’ve got to take it on the chin and understand that there’s a lot of people out there that can do it better than you and I understand that [said tongue in cheek].”

While Pulis has learned to deal with that aspect of the game, he also accepts players have to too. If Boro lose at managerless Reading today then they could well hit Christmas Day having dropped out of the play-off places in the Championship.

There were boos and jeers that greeted the final whistle in midweek because of the dip in form and with uncertainty over the futures of a number of players hanging around, he faces the task of having to lift his men for the Christmas period.

Pulis said: “I was quoted way back when we were second saying I won’t get too carried away being there and I won’t get too disappointed by the run we are on now, we have to remain focused on what we are trying to achieve.

“There are good people at this club, we have to stay focused. We are not that good where we can win every game at this level.

“The most important thing is you try to level everything out, it’s difficult with these social networks, TVs and radios programmes, to keep the players level. I am confident given a couple of players in January we will be fine, but keeping everyone around the place level is a big factor management wise.

“Fulham were mid-table when they came to us just after Christmas last season and they got promoted.

“You need to be level, you have to have your moments, the players have to have that belief. They have to give everything every game, the best they possibly can.”

Pulis has a couple of injury doubts to consider ahead of the trip to Reading, while Rudy Gestede is unlikely to figure even though he returned to training on Thursday. Gestede is wanted by Ipswich.

The Middlesbrough boss has had meetings with his players this week in a bid to hear what they have had to say about the situation and is hopeful of a turnaround.

Pulis said: “You’ve got to listen. At management level now I’ll talk to players one-on-one, I’ll talk to them in a small group, I’ll talk to them together as a big group.

“You do everything, I think that’s management, there’s no defining point where I say ‘I’ll do this and you do that’. I see it, I smell it, I look at it and think that’s the right thing to do.

“They prefer to win, they prefer to play well and they prefer to score goals. If you look at the game against Burton we had a 20-minute spell where we had four opportunities in their box where players were one-on-one with the goalkeeper.”

Despite Middlesbrough’s missing the pace in attack which was lost when Adama Traore was sold to Wolves last summer, Pulis was still able to secure a promising start which had them top at one stage. They have always been in and around the top two until the last month.

Pulis said: “If you’d have told me we would have started like we had then I would have been jumping for joy, without doubt. We deserved it.

“We played well but we still weren’t clinical enough in front of goal and we could have scored more goals. There has always been that void what the team needed. It hasn’t changed since we walked in.

“I could sit here, moan and groan and, we have to get on with it. At the moment we are sixth, over a period of time that’s where we are and what we have done so far is reflected by that. There is a long way to go, more than half the season to go so we will see.”