Cobblers swoop for City kid

Northampton Town have brought Manchester City youngster Marc Laird to Sixfields on a one-month loan deal.

The midfielder has yet to make his first team bow for the Premiership club and will now look to further his education in League One after joining The Cobblers.

Laird is one of a promising crop of young players at Eastlands and Northampton boss Stuart Gray admits he is indebted to Stuart Pearce for allowing the 21-year-old to link up with his squad.

"He has been a regular in the [Manchester City] first team squad and has been around the matchday 16 for City for a while now," said Gray.

"He has been unfortunate in that players like Joey Barton and Claudio Reyna have been keeping him out of the Manchester City first team.

"The next stage of his development is to play league football and hopefully this move will work out well for all parties.

"He is a box to box midfield player who is very mobile and has plenty of energy.

"We really appreciate what Stuart Pearce and Manchester City have done in allowing us to borrow a player of Marc's quality and we hope that he will gain plenty from spending this loan spell with us."