Gary Peters swooped last night to strengthen his midfield with a promising young midfielder coming in.

21 year old Asa Hall was born in Sandwell and came through the ranks at Birmingham. The club had high hopes for the youngster but he hasn't quite broken into the first team at St Andrews as yet. A loan move to Boston saw him gain an insight into the midfield hustle and bustle of the lower reaches of the Coca Cola League.

Town manager Gary Peters has been impressed with Asa when he's seen him and is hoping that he can make the grade at Shrewsbury: "He's 21 years of age and hasn't played many games but is a very talented midfield player.

"He can pass and play; he gets goals and is one of the top scorers for the Birmingham reserves, likes to get forward into the box and has bags of talent.

"I've seen him play plenty of times and in reserve team football he has looked super.

"There is a chance that we can make the move permanent so we want to get him in and make sure he can play at our level as well.

"He's the last of his age group at Birmingham, they've kept him and kept him expecting him to make the first team but it hasn't quite happened there.

"We are taking him to the end of the season and hoping to see if he can perform for us.

"He played at Boston on loan and I saw him play for them, I think it was two years ago, and he did a good job for them.

"He's got an idea of what it's like playing at this league from his time there."

Asa joined up with Town yesterday morning and took part in his first training session with his new club. He impressed the Town management and coaching staff and they are hoping he can carry that into the league performances: "He did very well yesterday in training and fitted in well with the lads.

"It's ok to do well in training but you have to be able to do the same in the cut and thrust of our league."

Town fans have commented that the club has missed Dave Edwards since his summer move to join to Luton. They have suggested that there is still a need for a young, athletic, tacking, box to box player and GP sees Asa as fitting this mould:"If you see him on the pitch he is a super passer of the ball and can see things, we'll just have to see if we are intelligent enough to see them.

"He's very much like Dave Edwards, even to look at, he's tall, slim, athletic and if he does as well as Dave then we will all be delighted."

The additions to the squad over the past week has seen the Town squad bolstered with some new faces. The manager has also seen some good performances in the league from his young players and this gives him a number of new options for the first team: "We've got a lot of young lads around the periphery of the side that we have to utilise in the reserves but put them in when they get the chance.

"We are already thinking of the future and not just this season and we've got people like Luke Jones, Steve Leslie, Chris Humphrey, Jimmy Ryan and now James Meredith. Players who are 19 or 20 and anyone of them you could put into the team and they could do a job.

"All of those lads have been given the chance to play and if they go in and take that chance you leave them in there. If they don't you pull them out, work on them a bit more and then put them back in another time but what you don't do is put them all in at once.

"We have young players who could go on to be super players if we give them enough time and patience.

"Their time will come just like Kelvin Langmead, Ben Herd, Neil Ashton, Marc Tierney, they all went in took their chance and learnt the hard way."

The addition of McIntyre, Briggs, Madjo, Meredith and now Hall but the one not yet to be announced is the experienced striker that GP has been looking for. A number of names have been linked but the Town manager is still perusing targets but insists that they must be right for his side: "We are still perusing things on that front and last week we brought another young striker in in Guy Madjo.

"He's 23 years old but it strong and quick and will get goals for us but we haven't brought that experienced striker in that people expected.

"We need to make sure that if we do that we get the right one and it works for the present and for the future.

"We can't just do things for a quick fix, we need to win games and win them fast but we can't have knee jerk reactions to some bad results and continue to work on the long term."