FAILING to earn a contract at Manchester United after a brief trial always left Teemu Tainio dreaming of playing in the Premier League and he is not prepared to give it up now.

Sunderland’s predicament at the wrong end of the Premier League table means the Finnish midfielder is desperate to avoid playing in the Championship next season.

Back in 1996, after failing to convince Sir Alex Ferguson he was worth a deal, Tainio headed for France to join Auxerre, where he spent eight years, before an aspiration to play in the English top division was finally fulfilled when Tottenham signed him on a free transfer.

After moving to Sunderland last summer, following three years at White Hart Lane, the 29-year-old is determined to make sure he does not suffer the embarrassment of relegation.

“There’s no way I would expect to be in the Championship next season,” said Tainio. “I am a Premier League footballer and this is a Premier League club, so we have to make sure that is the case next season.

“It’s very important to every club to stay in the Premier League and we have two massive games coming up and we have to make sure this club stays in the Premier League, where it should be.”

Tainio’s love affair with the Premier League started during his childhood. And after playing for his hometown club, TP-47, in Finland’s third division after agreeing a deal at the age of 14, it was always his intention to play in England.

“We used to watch one Premier League game every Saturday,” said Tainio.

“Everyone who liked football looked at the Premier League and I’m happy to be there now.

“For everyone who liked football that was the main game in Finland. I played seven years in France and in the back of my mind it was always coming to England that I thought about. I’m now living my dream and I want that to continue.”

Given his pedigree as an international footballer for Finland for the last 11 years, Tainio had certainly not been thinking about fighting to stay out of the bottom three when he moved to the North- East last July.

But instead of dwelling on the reasons why Sunderland sit just two points above the bottom three with matches against Portsmouth and Chelsea remaining, the defensive midfielder has chosen to think about the next fortnight instead.

While many are trying to predict the outcomes of Newcastle’s home date with Fulham, Hull’s trip to Bolton and Middlesbrough’s Riverside encounter with Aston Villa, Tainio thinks that Sunderland will stay up if they concentrate on themselves.

“There’s always a lot of speculation going on but you have to keep focused on the games you have got because you can only affect what you are doing,” he said.

“We said how many points we would need for survival and we are still on track. We only have two matches remaining and we have to make sure we get where we believed would be enough.”

Victories for both Newcastle and Hull today would see Sunderland head for Portsmouth on Monday in the relegation zone.

But manager Ricky Sbragia insists that such a turn of events would not dent his squad’s confidence after last weekend’s encouraging display at Bolton.

“It would be worse if we were due to play on Saturday and they’d won, with us losing,”

said Sbragia, who claims that he will not be taking any notice of today’s scores until after the final whistles have blown. “Instead we will have two days to address the situation.

It wouldn’t be a shock to the system. Things like that can happen.

“I would hope it doesn’t but there’s a possibility. People say that the Newcastle result last Monday was a surprise, I always thought they had that in them.

“West Brom are also coming up quite well. We still have to do it. We know what we have to do.”

Portsmouth manager Paul Hart would welcome a helping hand in his team’s push to clamber over the Barclays Premier League survival line this weekend.

Caretaker boss Hart has seen the Fratton Park recovery he started three months ago falter in the last four games, as Portsmouth have failed to score against Manchester United, Newcastle, Arsenal and Blackburn.

They remain in relegation danger, and the former Leeds and Nottingham Forest defender, who could be given a permanent deal if Portsmouth stay up, said: ‘‘You could argue we should have stuck this away well before now. It is still a concern.’’ He insisted: ‘‘We have been creating chances, that’s not the problem.

‘‘It has been finishing them that has been the problem. We haven’t done it and we’ve started crawling towards the line, but now we need a big jump.

‘‘If that happens through somebody else’s efforts over the weekend then I’ll be happy. We’ll all be happy. The sooner we are safe the better as far as I’m concerned.’’ Portsmouth’s last two games are at home to Sunderland on Monday night and away to Wigan.

It was at Wigan that they memorably clinched their great escape after looking doomed three years ago.