McClaren (right) was proud of his shot-stopper

The 33-year-old made a string of saves, the best being when he denied Daniele De Rossi and Alessandro Mancini.

"In defining moments, Mark made vital saves at the right time and that is what we needed," said McClaren.

"He kept a clean sheet at the Riverside, which more or less put us in the driving seat and won us this tie."

Middlesbrough lost Wednesday's match 2-1 at the Stadio Olympico, the tie finishing 2-2 on aggregate, but went through on the away goals rule.

Striker Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink gave Boro the lead before Roma's fightback.

You don't have nights like this very often in your career Boro boss Steve McClaren

"With Roma scoring before half-time, it opened up the game and we knew the next goal was going to be very important," added McClaren.

"With half-an-hour to go, that's a long time and it was the longest 30 minutes I've had for a long, long time.

"Credit to Roma, they kept going forward and forward but we resisted, the goalkeeper made excellent saves and we hung on and got through."

Middlesbrough captain Gareth Southgate believed Boro's success was also down to their ability to stand up to Roma's sustained pressure throughout the game.

"We took all our strikers off and didn't seem to get out of our half," said the Boro captain.

"But we managed to soak it up. Credit to everybody. It took guts and we had something to hang on to."