As it turned out, the first leg at Anfield was a tight affair and Boro took the lead when Townsend sent Merson through, but we eventually lost the leg 2-1. No-one really expected us to triumph after that. We were just a lowly First Division team and had to win by 2 clear goals. Still, the club announced that the game would be a “Flag Day”, encouraging the fans to bring scarves, flags and all manner of noisy things with them and make as much noise as possible. The club got it right and the atmosphere was incredible that night, arguably the best it has ever been at the Riverside. Even Mark Page was caught up in the buzz, putting aside his usual cack-handed choreography and helping to get the capacity crowd going with stirring pieces of classical music. There was just something in the air that night, and it wasn’t just precipitation.

 It must have carried to the dressing room. Boro came out and took a 2-0 lead within a few minutes. A Merson penalty and a goal from debutant veteran striker Marco Branca, fresh off the plane from Italy, put the fans into a state of utter delirium. All we had to do now was hold out for the remaining 85 minutes plus stoppage time. A young full-back called Steve Baker gave the performance of his life to man-mark Steve McManaman out of the game and Liverpool just couldn’t get any rhythm going. Boro played like the lions on their shirt, roared on by the joyous noise from the stands, and pulled off an amazing, unexpected victory to get back to Wembley.

 Some of that special atmosphere echoed into the weekend with Boro putting the Mackems to the sword for the third time that season. Branca scored again – twice – and another new signing, the young, floppy-fringed Armstrong, got on the score sheet in a 3-1 win. It was all going swimmingly. Automatic promotion was within reach and another cup final beckoned.

 It was around then that matters at work suddenly solidified and I was told that I was needed in the USA. I couldn’t turn such a chance down. I had never been outside Europe and now my job was giving me the opportunity to see the big wide world. I had to accept. I wasn’t sure how long I’d be going for, but it had the potential to turn into a long-term move, although I would be going alone to start with.

 Out of the blue, Boro’s fortunes took a sudden, unexpected nose-dive. A 4-0 battering away to fellow promotion contenders Forest was followed by an abject 5-0 humiliation at QPR, featuring the infamous antics of on-loan ‘keeper, Andy Dibble. We were slipping, and our goal difference had suffered somewhat, courtesy of 9 goals conceded without reply. We went into the next home game against Swindon needing to score six to go back to the top. And, as it happened, this would also be my last game before I travelled to America.

 The six goals duly came. Branca, Armstrong and Neil “Mad House” Madison got a brace apiece, with Madison scoring from a quite stunning long-range volley from the edge of the area. That was a goal of the season contender itself, but not to be outdone, Branca scored with a beauty of an overhead bicycle kick as just as full time was approaching, and Boro stormed back to the top of Division One. It was a superb way for me to leave them.

 My view of the remaining few games of the season was somewhat patchy and obscured. I had to rely on my wife to relay the scores when I spoke to her on the phone or listen to reports on the BBC’s World Service. There was no broadband internet and no world-wide wall-to-wall TV coverage of English Premier League football, let alone mention of the lower leagues. I was surrounded by people whose idea of sport was spending 3 hours plastered in body paint watching blokes in tights and shoulder-pads running on and off a field covered in lines and numbers, and sometimes they might even throw the ball. Or there was baseball, which was probably as inscrutable to me as cricket is to an American.

 Still, I managed to follow the results. Boro - or Typical Boro, as I was now starting to call them after a couple of seasons – seemed to be doing their best to avoid automatic promotion and take their chances in the lottery of the play-offs. At the start of April we lost two consecutive away games to West Brom and Sheffield United (one of those teams I was learning was a bogey team) and things weren’t looking too clever. Somewhere around that time Boro signed another couple of players – a Colombian chap called Hamilton Ricard and a Geordie called Paul Gascoigne. You may have heard of him. It was hoped these two new recruits would help Boro in their final push for promotion.

 Then came the Coca-Cola Cup final, against Chelsea. Chelsea, Chelsea, Chelsea. They seem to have a habit of standing in Boro’s way at Wembley. They had won the ZDS final in 1990 and the FA Cup last year, and here they were again: brazen, blue, cockney sparras, trying to play with the big boys in the top flight. Who did they think they were? You can’t take anyone seriously when Santa Claus is in charge.

 My wife and sister-in-law went to the game, but my experience of the final was via my little, portable short-wave radio that I’d bought in Radio Shack. I’d hoped that they might carry the whole game, but instead concentrated on a couple of Premier League games that were on at the same time with the odd report from Wembley. It was 0-0 at full time and went into extra-time. We still had a chance, then, and here I was, 4,000 miles away listening to a crackly radio that only gave me snippets of action. I should have been there, witnessing what could have been the biggest day in Boro’s history. Damn ambition. Damn my nomadic spirit.

 Then came the news that there had been a goal. They didn’t say to whom, but joined the commentary just before the goal to ramp up the tension for Boro and Chelsea fans around the globe. “Gascoigne with the ball in midfield,” said the commentator. “It’s a Boro goal,” thought I, “it has to be if we’ve got the ball!”

 Wrong. Gazza lost the ball and before I knew it Chelsea were in the lead. I can’t remember who scored, someone instantly forgettable like Eddie Newton perhaps, it doesn’t really matter. The game was up. Chelsea scored a second soon after and I switched off my radio. I had been considering hunting down the off-chance of a delayed relay of the game in some sports bar somewhere down town, but decided I couldn’t face it. There was no point now. I consoled myself with a Chinese takeaway from the restaurant round the corner from my apartment. The restaurant was called Robert Lee’s. Give me a break.

 My next big meeting with the radio was on the 3^rd May – the final day of the season. Boro had strung together a good run to keep themselves in contention, with three 1-0 wins against Reading, Man City and Port Vale followed by a 1-1 draw with Wolves leading up to the last game at home to Oxford. Forest were already up and it was between ourselves and Sunderland for the second automatic spot. We had to win to be sure.

 I existed in a somewhat agitated, unknowing state all morning until I was able to get the result on the radio. The final scores came through and I waited patiently, imagining every possibility, every permutation. For me they all existed simultaneously, like some quantum physics experiment featuring an irritated cat in a box. Finally, I was put out of my misery. Middlesbrough 4, Oxford United 1. We were up. Get in.

 My stay in America didn’t last long. I was offered a long-term position but for various reasons – mainly my wife’s reluctance to move there – I decided to return to the North East of England. In my last few weeks over there I was able to see a couple of the opening games of the ’98 World Cup on a large screen in a British pub that I had come to call my second home in Minneapolis. The American commentators on the US channels were clueless, but that didn’t matter. I was amongst fellow Englishmen, watching a football game, singing songs, drinking beer and it felt good. Oh, and I couldn’t miss out on Boro’s return to the Premier League, could I now?