Boro have broken their club record transfer fee to land £8.15m Empoli striker Maccarone, but it will be an even bigger story if they can persuade the Brazilian for a third time that his future lies on Teesside.

Chief executive Keith Lamb brokered the Juninho deal after flew to Spain yesterday to meet officials from Atletico Madrid, and now the club will enter into negotiations with the 29-year-old and his representatives in a bid to push home their interest.

‘‘Keith Lamb has agreed a fee with Atletico Madrid for Juninho,’’ said a club spokesman.

‘‘We will commence negotiations with the player and his agent in the next couple of days.’’

The news will do no harm at all to season tickets sales as this weekend’s deadline for renewals approaches, and few names give so much cause for excitement on Teesside as that of the mercurial midfielder who took the town by storm after his arrival from Sao Paolo in a £4.75m move in November 1995.

Juninho was outstanding as he took to the Premiership like a duck to water, but tragedy struck for Robson when, after his side lost in both domestic cup finals, they were relegated into the bargain, sparking his exit and that of 31-goal Italian striker Fabrizio Ravanelli.

Having headed for Madrid in a bid to preserve his international career, the Brazilian suffered a bad leg fracture and missed out on the 1998 World Cup finals anyway, and on his return to Teesside on loan in September 1999, failed to show the form of his first spell with the club and an option to buy him back was not taken up.

However, a loan spell at Vasco da Gama helped him to regain his place in the national squad, and he capped his return to somewhere near his best by coming on as a late substitute to pick up a winners’ medal at the end of Sunday’s World Cup final victory over Germany.