Pictures: Seventeen years ago this week Boro were 1-0 up with minutes to go in a Wembley cup final. Surely this was the breakthrough moment?
Gallery: Middlesbrough v Leicester City Coca-Cola Cup Final 1997
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Two minutes from glory. Two minutes from a trophy.
Two minutes from European football, from getting the escape velocity to break away from the basement, from keeping top flight momentum and a star-studded summer of Galactico recruitment that would catapult mighty Boro to world domination.
It was April 6, 1997.
We were within touching distance of a first-ever major trophy, of a famous victory that would vindicate a team and a town fuelled by righteous anger over the Three Points scandal.
We would show them.
Fabrizio Ravanelli had long ago become a much-misquoted disruptive, divisive figure and was far from the electric prolific presence he had been in that August of optimism - but he had scored the winner for Boro at Wembley.
Just think about that: A goal for Boro at Wembley. The first ever. It was the stuff of playground dreams.
Boro were a goal up at Wembley. With two minutes to go.
Two minutes. With three subs to make, to break up play, to stifle any hope of a Leicester fight-back.
To get it in the corner, to go down injured, to put it in row Z. Two minutes. TWO MINUTES!
Then crack! Heskey-shaped heart-break. Shattered teeth, broken dreams and broken season. Typical Boro.
BORO: Schwarzer, Cox, Fleming, Pearson, Festa, Hignett, Mustoe, Juninho, Emerson, Beck, Ravanelli. Subs: Vickers, Blackmore, Moore.
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