Juninho pledges best is still to come for Boro

JUNINHO has pledged to play the best football of his career when he returns to action with Middlesbrough.

The 29-year-old Brazilian midfielder completed his return to Teesside in a £3.8 million move from Atletico Madrid last summer, but suffered cruciate knee ligament damage in a pre-season tournament in Italy just days after he had made his latest debut, and scored, in a friendly clash with Alaves at the Riverside Stadium.

Juninho is continuing his rehabilitation following a successful operation in America at Professor Nivaldo Baldo’s sports physiotherapy centre in Campinas, near Sao Paulo.