Memories still as vivid as day Boro lifted Cup

Steve McClaren

WHEN Steve McClaren delivers his pre-match teamtalk at the Riverside Stadium tomorrow, 290 miles away Chelsea and Liverpool will be aiming to succeed Middlesbrough as Carling Cup holders in Cardiff.

There will be no thoughts from McClaren swaying towards developments in South Wales for at least 90 minutes but this weekend last year will live forever in the memory of the Boro boss.

Twelve months on he still has goose pimples when a picture of the Millennium Stadium is beamed onto his television and he doesn't expect that to change for the rest of his life.

From May 2006 all domestic cup finals will be switched back to the new Wembley, meaning a return to the Welsh capital will be unlikely as a club manager - unless the Carling Cup can return to Teesside in a year's time.

And McClaren said: "The Millennium Stadium will always have a special place in my heart. It's funny because whenever the stadium is on the television, whether it is Rugby Union like when England were beaten by the Welsh, I get a lump in my throat when I watch.

"It's just going to be a place that I will never forget. I don't suppose anyone at the club will ever forget the Millennium Stadium after all it was the place where Middlesbrough Football Club finally landed a trophy."

Boro are McClaren's first managerial job and he will always be remembered as the first man to guide the club to major silverware, no matter where his career goes from here.

The former Manchester United No 2 has been tipped as the next England boss by many and he said: "It was an enormous achievement for the club but it was also a massive achievement for me. No matter what happens in the future I will be able to look back at the day I won my first trophy in football management."

Rob Nicholls

LAST FEBRUARY'S success will live forever in the memory of Middlesbrough supporters, yet there were very few that weekend who expected anything less than a first major honour for the club.

Rob Nicholls - the editor of Boro's Fly Me To The Moon fanzine - just as thousands of others from Teesside, made the trip down to Cardiff to enjoy the party atmosphere building up the night before the big event.

And, even after the three cup final defeats in 1996 and 1997, Nicholls was in no doubt about Boro ending their long, long wait for silverware in the Millennium Stadium against Bolton 12 months ago.

But he admits the club's newly crowned title of Carling Cup winners took a little adjusting to. "That sense of achievement made up for a lifetime of supporting Boro through a lot of tough times," he said.

"In recent years we have become a club known for reaching finals and losing but before those we rarely even reached semi-finals and quarter-finals, never mind finals.

"Looking back to Wales, there was a fantastic atmosphere. In the Cardiff pubs on the Saturday night you could sense that everyone thought 2004 was going to be Boro's year.

"Even the Bolton fans did, I'm sure of it. They'd had problems over ticket distribution and they were more bothered about that at the time. The Boro fans were all just enjoying life, waiting for the big day."

Nicholls, as a result of that trophy success, has been on UEFA Cup trips to Graz, Villarreal, Athens and Ostrava but he doesn't want those glory nights to end there.

"I would love us to finish in the top six this year and qualify for Europe via the league," said Nicholls.

"That would help this club get noticed even more. To finish higher than Jack Charlton's side's seventh placed finish in 1975 would be a great achievement. That's the next step.

"Travelling to all these places has been a fantastic experience and there isn't anyone who wants those days to stop this season."

James Morrison

IT IS hard to imagine a swifter rise in professional football. On February 28, 2004, James Morrison travelled down to Cardiff with a couple of school friends from Darlington as a relatively unknown Academy player.

He organised his own accommodation in the Welsh capital on the Saturday night before taking his seat in the Millennium Stadium to witness Boro win the Carling Cup.

Nearly 12 months on and Morrison, 18, has been one of the main beneficiaries of that final success and he scored one of the goals in the 2-1 win over Grazer AK in the UEFA Cup on Thursday night.

At least the youngster was involved in the celebrations at Cardiff last season though, surely? "Yes I was there, I watched the rest of the squad from the stands celebrating on the pitch afterwards," said Morrison.

"It's amazing how things turn round. It's completely mad when I look back on that now. It was great to be down there to witness it, as all the youth team were, but I wasn't even involved."

Morrison was part of Dave Parnaby and Mark Proctor's young guns that went onto enjoy their own trophy success by lifting the FA Youth Cup for the first time in the club's history a couple of months later.

Since then, along with Tony McMahon and Matthew Bates, the England youth international has enjoyed an unbelievable first season as a senior professional.

He has scored four goals, three of which have come in the UEFA Cup, and Morrison said: "I didn't expect to have played as many games as I have this season but it's been fantastic.

"I have been with the club since I was 11 so to be playing alongside such big names has been great.

"It's not been that much of a surprise because I have always been confident in my ability. I just didn't expect to have had such a big part."

Chris Tomlinson

GIVEN that Middlesbrough's Carling Cup success came on a date intrinsically linked to leap years, it is somewhat ironic that the best leaper in Britain was forced to miss it.

Long jumper Chris Tomlinson, a born and bred Boro fan from his earliest days, followed the club's march to Cardiff with a mixture of pride and pessimism.

Pride because, after years of watching his hometown club flatter to deceive, there was a growing awareness that tangible success was just around the corner.

But also pessimism because, while his closest friends planned a weekend in Wales, Tomlinson knew he would be unable to join the party.

While Middlesbrough's players finally ended 128 years of hurt, the 22-year-old found himself flying on a plane to Germany in preparation for the forthcoming World Indoor Championships in Budapest.

Sport at the highest level can bring plenty of rewards, but frantically receiving text message updates in the arrival lounge of a German airport is hardly what dreams are made of.

"I've had to sacrifice things throughout my career," said Tomlinson. "But missing out on the final was definitely one of the hardest things I've had to do because of my athletics.

"I've been a massive Boro fan for as long as I can remember but, on the day of the game, I had to fly out to Germany for an indoor competition.

"That was hard, and it wasn't helped that I was totally out of reach during the time I was on the plane.

"My mobile phone had to be switched off so, as soon as we were in the airport building, I got a load of messages all at once telling me what had happened.

"It was a bit like going through all of the emotions of the final in about ten seconds, but it still felt great when I found out that we'd won."

David Shayler

DAVID Shayler is no stranger to whistle-blowing but, as the final seconds of stoppage time ebbed away at the Millennium Stadium, the fervent Middlesbrough fan thought referee Mike Riley was never going to oblige with his mouthpiece.

The former MI5 agent attended his first Middlesbrough game in 1974, and subsequently endured 30 years of failure as countless opportunities for silverware were squandered.

But, after following every step of the club's Carling Cup quest, Shayler travelled to Cardiff confident that Boro's 128-year wait for glory was almost at an end.

"I can remember watching quarter-final and semi-final defeats in the League Cup as a child," said Shayler, who was convicted under the Official Secrets Act for passing classified information and documents to the press. "And then in 1997, I was about to go on record so I was having to arrange all kinds of meetings around the club's two Wembley appearances.

"But last year was different. For once, there was a real confidence amongst the Middlesbrough fans - we all seemed to know it was going to happen.

"The first ten minutes were surreal - I don't think anybody expected us to be two goals ahead so quickly - but that just cranked the atmosphere up even further.

"The last five minutes seemed to last an eternity, but there wasn't a single minute when I didn't think we were going to win. As a Middlesbrough fan, that's quite an unusual feeling."

Shayler is as committed to the cause as ever and, with Boro continuing to chase a Champions League place, he feels a top-four finish is a possibility this season.

"This season has promised an awful lot," he said. "And so far, I think it's delivered.

"In the past, we've sunk like a stone after Christmas. We've had a wobble this time round but, for once, it hasn't really been anything more than that.

"I still we can get that fourth Champions League place. We've played all the big names and, on paper at least, our run-in doesn't seem to be that bad."

Steve Gibson

THERE will be many lasting memories of Boro's first ever major trophy success and arguably the biggest one of all is of chairman Steve Gibson celebrating with the players on the Millennium Stadium turf.

As the 30,000 supporters sang the name of their match-winning heroes and chanted their appreciation of the work carried out by Steve McClaren, there was one other man who they eulogised about: Gibson.

He celebrated a decade in control of his beloved club last year and at the beginning of his tenure he dreamed about guiding Boro into Europe. But the work hasn't stopped there.

"It's a year on and the club have used the opportunity to step on a few stones and we have moved on," said Gibson, fresh from watching his club qualify for the last 16 of the UEFA Cup.

"We will never forget that day in Cardiff and nor should we. It was a fantastic occasion that took this club onto the next level. European football and trophies have always been missing at this club, suddenly they both arrived this time last year.

"I don't want to look into the future too far and we have a really important game on Sunday against Charlton. But we are always looking to move up and up. A top six finish is not improbable this year."

A result of the Millennium Stadium success over Bolton has been memorable away trips throughout Europe and, courtesy of Thursday's victory over Grazer, a trip to Sporting Lisbon on March 17 caps them all.

"It will be a bit warmer in Lisbon than it was at the Riverside," said Gibson. "The club was unheard of in Europe and to get into the last 16 people suddenly take notice.

"It's very exciting for us all here. Throughout Europe clubs are passionate about their football and Middlesbrough was a small town in the UK and we have placed ourselves on the European map."

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