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Diary - Friday 21 February 2003

21 February 2003

You'll never guess who Town have just signed! It's John "No way am I going back to Grimsby" Oster, no less, back for a third month's loan. The player was recalled by Sunderland boss Howard Wilkinson at the end of December to improve his rubbish team, and made an immediate impact by crossing for Kevin Phillips to score an equaliser against Bolton in an FA Cup tie. Wilkinson confirmed his renowned managerial acumen by dropping him again, and his team are now bottom of the Premiership. Oster, though, insisted as recently as last week that he had no intention of returning to Blundell Park - but hey, his volte-face is our gain. Because the Welsh international winger has already spent two months with the Mariners this season, Town would have to sign him 'permanently' for him to stay longer than this month; but new scientific research has revealed that Grimsby supporters have evolved an advanced psychotemporal function that prevents them thinking more than a week into the future.

And that's not all, folks - we've finally bagged a central midfielder too. Twenty-three-year-old Richard Hughes is quite liderally not in the same league as earlier loan targets Carlos Marinelli and Michael Stewart, but he is a former Scottish under-21 international and scored 14 goals in 123 league starts for Bournemouth (bless 'em) before joining Portsmouth last summer. He hasn't played for them much - probably owing to his British origin and relatively small transfer fee of £100,000 - but figured in the league leaders' 1-0 win at Blundell Park back in August. Before his spell at Bournemouth, Hughes was on the books at Arsenal and Atalanta.

Both Hughes and Oster are expected to line up in tomorrow's team to face Ipswich, and Alan Pouton may be back in contention. Town have no new injury worries, and it's not every day you can say that. Pablo Counago begins a four-match ban for Ipswich, while defender Herman Hreidarsson serves the second game of his, and tasty young striker Darren Ambrose is doubtful after getting hurt in his side's 4-2 defeat by Wolves the other night.

Today's sharing of happy tidings concludes with an amusing website for you to look at. Make sure you keep on reading to the bottom of the page.