Jordan signs in time to face Toon

By Albatross
July 31 2003

The news from St. James Park is that a strong squad will be on view at the Vic; and making his first appearance for Pools may well be Andrew Jordan, who's signed today as expected. Shame it's not his second spell for us, I could have used the headline Jordan: The Comeback....

As expected, Jordan has put pen to paper on a deal at Pools, rumoured to be for two years. His first chance to impress the Poolie faithful may well be on Friday Night against Newcastle; meanwhile, York have acted to replace Jordan by signing Richard Hope, who had of course been on trial at Pools for some time.

The Newcastle squad for the game is somewhat stronger than we first thought. With Toon taking on Sheffield Wednesday at the same time, it looked like we might have to put up with a reserve team; but with names like Given, Woodgate, Jenas, Speed, Solano, Robert, Bellamy and Shearer in the squad travelling down to the Vic it's the Hillsborough team that will have most of the lesser lights on display. It looks like it might be worth the £9 entry fee after all.

Jordan is Neale Cooper's fourth signing of the summer, and he may well not be the last. A number of trialists were on view in the 4-1 win over Billingham Town last night, with Chris Moore doing his chances no harm at all by scoring twice from the left wing, Matt O'Halloran getting an opportunity wide on the right, and Pedro Dimas replacing Moore at the break. Matty Robson and Steven Istead both impressed again, with Istead also getting stuck in to the extend he spent ten minutes on the sidelines cooling down after an incident early in the second half.

Cooper was also trying out a few things, with both Adam Boyd and Jermaine Easter starting the game in midfield - meaning that we had no less than four strikers on the pitch at once.

There's no game tonight (Thursday), but with the Toon on Friday Evening and then a match at Whitby on Saturday to finish off, it's been a hectic few days. Some players have enhanced their reputations, others haven't - and there still seem to be a few places up for grabs.

One player who won't be signing for Pools though is the Billy Town 'keeper; his performance even had some fans talking about Brian "Flapper" Cox in fond terms. All of a sudden the Taff/Provett setup doesn't seem so bad......