Loan round-up: Moran magic wins it for Stoke

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2025-02-04T06:00+00:00

Andrew Moran celebrates after scoring Stoke City's winner at Hull City on Saturday.

Andrew Moran was the match-winner for Stoke on Saturday in their important win against fellow Championship strugglers, Hull City.

Moran came off the bench for the final half an hour and scored what proved to be the winner for the Potters, who had gone behind after just six minutes, with a wonderful half-volley which flew into the top corner from 12 yards.

It was Mark Robins’ first win as Stoke boss and afterwards, he said: “Andy’s goal was brilliant. His first touch was good but his second was even better.

“Getting his foot up so quickly was excellent and it was his goal that saw us over the line. I’m delighted.”

Elsewhere in the second tier, James Beadle and Sheffield Wednesday drew 1-1 with Luton as the Hatters finally ended their run of 11 consecutive away defeats and Jeremy Sarmiento played in two draws for Burnley.

The Clarets haven’t conceded a goal in over 12 hours after playing out 0-0 stalemates against Leeds and Portsmouth, with our Ecuadorian loanee playing 16 minutes on Monday before he was subbed off after an hour at Fratton Park.

Mark O’Mahony missed that game against Scott Parker’s side, as well as Pompey’s 1-0 defeat to Millwall in midweek, due to an ongoing injury issue while Amario Cozier-Duberry was an unused substitute as Blackburn beat Preston 2-1 in a fiery Lancashire derby.

In the league above, Julio Enciso played 89 minutes for Ipswich against Southampton and looked bright, but couldn’t prevent the Tractor Boys from losing 2-1, while Facundo Buonanotte was an unused substitute for Leicester as they lost 4-0 at Everton.

Further down the footballing pyramid, there was success in League One for Odel Offiah as Blackpool beat Lincoln 2-0 during the week before drawing 2-2 with Charlton on Saturday, with the full-back playing the full 90 in both fixtures.

Kamari Doyle also enjoyed a good start to life in the third tier with Crawley, coming on for the final quarter of an hour against Mansfield on Tuesday as Rob Elliot’s team won 1-0, but his 13-minute cameo against Wrexham on Saturday didn’t prevent a 2-1 defeat.

Samy Chouchane wasn’t in Northampton’s squad as they beat League One high-flyers Huddersfield 3-2 and Luca Barrington also missed out through injury in League Two as his Grimsby side drew 1-1 with Gillingham and beat Bromley 2-0.

Tom McGill was involved in fourth tier action but had to watch on from the bench as MK Dons won in the week against Harrogate, before he was between the sticks for their 2- 0 defeat at Doncaster on Saturday.

In Scotland and Europe, there was also a mixture of results for our loanees with Ben Jackson involved in a thrilling SPFL Trophy fixture with Queens Park against East Kilbride. At full-time the score was 2-2, but by the 120th minute, Jackson’s side won 6-2 with our centre-back playing 114 minutes.

Elsewhere in Europe, Stefanos Tzimas, who has signed a contract with us until 2030 but will spend the second half of the season on loan at FC Nuremberg, played 90 minutes in Bundesliga 2 as Der Altmeister beat Darmstadt 1-0.

Stefanos Tzimas helped Nuremburg win a seven-goal thriller against Magdeburg. 📷 James Boardman.

There was also victory for Kjell Scherpen and Malick Yalcouye in the Champions League as they beat RB Leipzig 1-0, with both playing the full 90, but the duo couldn’t prevent a 2-0 defeat in Austrian OFB Cup against Austria Wien.

Ibrahim Osman and Abdallah Sima had less joy in the Champions League with the former’s Feyenoord losing 6-1 at Lille and the latter’s Stade Brest beaten 3-0 by Real Madrid.

Feyenoord also lost on their return to league action at the weekend, but Osman was an unused sub in Sunday’s 2-1 defeat to Ajax, while Sima and Brest also tasted domestic defeat against PSG with our striker playing 70 minutes of the 5-2 loss.

In the Women’s Championship, Lily Dent and Hannah Poulter started for Portsmouth, with Comfort Erhabor on the bench, but London City beat our south coast neighbours 1-0.