Simon Davies’ side drew 1-1 with top-of-the-table Sunderland U21s last time out with Aleix Garcia grabbing the equaliser in a tight game at the Academy Stadium.
Friday’s opponents are bottom of the league, trailing 11th place Norwich by two points, and are without a win in twelve league games.
They last tasted victory on 17 November when they overcame the Canaries 5-0 at the Colney Training Centre.
Although Boro are at the opposite end of the table to City, defender Kean Bryan knows that they will be in for a difficult afternoon at the Riverside Stadium.
He said: “The game on Friday will be a tough test, nearly all of the games are in this league.
“We’ll go there full of confidence and hopefully be able to come away with the three points.”
Bryan continued: “We came up against top of the league last time out and I thought we did well against them.
“We could have took our opportunities a bit better but we were happy with the point.”
Manager Davies is also wary of the threat Middlesbrough U21s pose and believes that if the young Blues focus on themselves rather that the opposition, a positive result will follow.
The 41-year old stated: “It’s hard to gauge what team you’re going to play against because they’re at different stages in their season and sometimes you see first team players involved.
“The best thing we can do is concentrate on ourselves and hopefully that should be enough on the night.”
We’ll have coverage of the game on our official Twitter, @MCFC, and a match report will be on mcfc.co.uk shortly after full time.
