AFTER delivering perfect performances to overcome three of the Premiership's best this season, Middlesbrough manager Steve McClaren has called for an English-style display that will send shockwaves around Europe tonight.

Former Italian champions AS Roma face Boro in the first leg of the UEFA Cup's last-16 at the Riverside Stadium, when the vast majority of the football world expect the visitors to gain the initiative in the tie.

But, having beaten Chelsea, Manchester United and Arsenal on home soil already this season, confidence is high that there can be a repeat against one of the biggest clubs around.

The mind games have started - Roma refused to train at the Riverside last night in fear of giving away their team selection while McClaren snubbed the chance to reveal his formation - and that is only helping to build up the tension.

Boro know their opponents are favourites to progress into the quarter-finals but that is something McClaren feels can boost his own side's chances of going through.

And he chose to identify last season's 2-0 success over Roma's big-city rivals, Lazio, in the group stage of the UEFA Cup as an indication as to just what can be achieved against the cream of the continent.

"We have to give a performance like we did against Lazio when we made it aggressive and played with a high tempo," said McClaren. "If you play the European style you'll get beaten and if you play the English way you'll beat them.

"Who wouldn't want to play in this game? I have seen an intensity in training this week and they are taking this as a challenge, rather than a pressure.

"It would be a real shock to European football if we won. They have only been beaten once in the last four months and are huge favourites. Italy already knows about us after last season, let's make sure they know a little more.

"They will be fearing us and why wouldn't they be?

"We respect Roma, we know they are a very good team, but we know on our day we are capable of beating anybody, especially at the Riverside.

"I want them to go in and give the kind of performance we have had against the likes of Manchester United and Chelsea."

McClaren talked extensively about making sure Boro make sure the 'game plan is right' against their illustrious opponents, but refused to give too much detail away.

Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink, with two goals in Europe to his name this season, is available again after the flu and is in contention for a place in the side - the question being where?

The Boro manager is toying with the idea of playing with one up front against Roma, artists of the counter-attacking style, but he knows if he does they will also have to be adventurous.

That means an awful lot would rest on the shoulders of whoever was to play on the right of a five-man midfield, with Hasselbaink and Yakubu's name even being suggested.

Whatever team McClaren does decide to field he knows his players will be up against a Roma team that is unbeaten in 16 games in all competitions, even without star men Francesco Totti and Vincenzo Montella.

It is for this reason McClaren is urging the Teesside public, with a few thousand empty seats expected tonight, to turn out in force to witness one of the most groundbreaking night's in the club's history.

"Crowds in Europe are huge. In the Premier League you are used to away fans and the noise," said McClaren, who must decide whether to play Tony McMahon or Andrew Davies instead of the injured right-back Stuart Parnaby.

"When you travel away in Europe it's doubly difficult because of the environment, the stadiums and the different cultures.

Added to that there is a completely different atmosphere and it adds to the difficulty of getting a result.

"I'm encouraging the fans to turn up and we have to give them a performance in which they can built that atmosphere. They have a huge part to play in making it an intimidating atmosphere for Roma."

Chairman Steve Gibson, so often keen to retain a low profile from the spotlight of professional football, knows just what tonight's match means to the club he has supported all of his life.

Under Gibson's leadership Boro have become a force to be reckoned with domestically and an occasion like this offers McClaren the chance to prove that that has now been transformed on to the Euro scene.

"The last four or five years have been pure theatre for this football club,'' said the man who appointed McClaren in the summer of 2001 after the departure of Bryan Robson.

"We seem to keep on having our biggest game ever, with the prospect of every one being more exciting and bigger than the last.

"It would be hard to imagine a more exciting challenge than the one we face against a Roma side that is absolutely flying in Serie A."

Roma have suspended midfielder Daniele De Rossi missing this evening as Boro aim to make it eight wins from nine matches, which would give themselves the perfect platform to go to the Stadio Olimpico for the return leg next Wednesday.

AS Roma line-up (probable): Curchi; Panucci, Mexes, Taddei, Chivu, Perrotta; Aquilani, Tomassi, Cufre, Rosi; Mancini.

Middlesbrough line-up (possible): Schwarzer; Davies, Riggott, Southgate, Queudrue; Hasselbaink, Mendieta, Boateng, Cattermole, Downing; Yakubu.

Read more about Middlesbrough here.