Portsmouth have every right to celebrate their promotion to the Premiership after proving themselves the outstanding team in Division One throughout the season - but the real battle lies ahead.

If they thought winning the First Division title was tough, they are about to discover that ensuring top flight survival is a whole lot harder.

Two of last season's three promoted clubs have achieved the initial target of avoiding the drop after all three went about it in different ways.

Manchester City already boasted a Premier-style set-up under manager Kevin Keegan, Birmingham City's mega-rich owners were rewarded for their bold January transfer window investment to ensure survival and West Bromwich Albion paid the price of relegation for putting the financial stability of the club before risking all on a gamble to stay up.

Not that they can be blamed for that. In recent years Bradford City and Barnsley both spent to try and stay in the Premiership, failed and have been struggling desperately ever since.

Bradford have just narrowly avoided a further drop from Division One while Barnsley have only just survived the further ignominy of going down to Division Three.

Relegation just about drove Leicester City, who have overcome the financial problems caused by spending on their new stadium to bounce back into the Premiership, out of business while the effects of the drop have pushed Ipswich Town into administration.

Different circumstances affect different clubs in different ways both on the way up and on the way down but falling to the temptations of risking all on ensuring top-flight survival is rarely the wisest course.

"Throwing money at a situation doesn't guarantee success. You can spend a lot of money and still go down," warns sport and leisure analyst David Pope, of Brewer Dolphin, who, on past evidence, expects Portsmouth, who will be restricted by the income from the 19,420 capacity at Fratton Park, to be "frugal and sensible."

Pompey, boosted by former Arsenal and England star Paul Merson's decision to have one final hurrah in the Premiership at the age of 35 after playing such a big part in their championship success, will receive between £16million and £18million in additional television revenue in the big league.

"The quantifiable bits are the TV money but, historically, the largest portion of that goes on player wages because managers like to strengthen their squads and clubs have to reward their players for taking them up," he said as he pointed out: "Some clubs maybe go up a few seasons before they are really ready to operate in the Premiership."

But clubs can provide their own safety net by not mortgaging themselves up to the hilt by getting tied into long contracts with highly-paid football mercenaries and when it comes to doing that Pompey boss Harry Redknapp is a shrewd operator.

"Bolton and other clubs like them haven't spent heavily on transfer fees but have brought in people on high wages on loan deals and short-term contracts.

"It's sensible because if things go wrong they are not stuck with those players and, although it is a short-term mindset, it can prove successful," added Pope.