Nigel Clough pulled a rabbit... or should I say a Swede from the Cottage when he landed Swedish international defender Fredrik Stoor.
After much speculation about possible right backs being targeted by the club Stoor comes as a bolt out of the blue.
The right back was signed on Saturday and found himself immediately on the bench for the Bristol game. Stoors initial loan is for 6 games which will mean around a month at the club.
The 6 foot, 25 year old defender was born Fredrik Olof Esaias Stoor Siekkinen in Stockholm and started playing with his home town club Hammarby as a youth player. After rising through the ranks his professional career at the club produced 51 appearances and scored 2 goals.
At the age of 17 he trialed with Manchester United but it wasn’t until December 2006 that he joined Norwegian club Rosenborg making 46 appearances for the first team, including 7 in European competitions.
Impressive performances for Rosenborg caused much interest for his signature from Premiership clubs before he finally signed for Fulham in 2008 and made his debut against Leicester City in their Carling Cup 2nd round tie.
Since joining the cottagers he has been unable to win a regular place in the first team and rumors of him being up for sale did the rounds before the start of the 09/10 season.
Stoor has been capped by Sweden on 10 occasions over the last year took part in their Euro 2008 campaign.
His experience and obvious ability will be worrying for the Rams former skipper Paul Connolly who will now be looking over his shoulder at the new signing.
I would think it very unlikely that a Swedish international of Stoors pedigree would agree to join a Championship team to sit on the bench.
But Nigel did say his players will have to earn their place, perhaps it is more a case of Connolly having spent his.