By Brian Bennett

Sam Fishburn, Ashington’s new on-loan signing from Scunthorpe United, made his first appearance for the club in the 3-1 away defeat at Bridlington Town – then revealed afterwards that he could have been facing the Colliers at the Mounting Systems Stadium on Saturday instead of playing for them!

“Funnily enough, I was supposed to be signing for Bridlington – but I wanted to come to Ashington instead!” said the 21-year-old striker who is based in Gosforth, “All I want is to do the best I can, get as much game time as possible and obviously help the boys to get up the table. Today, I thought I did alright to be fair because it was my first 90 minutes for probably over a month so fitness wise it was good to get a start.”

Gateshead-born Fishburn is eligible to play for the Colliers in Tuesday night’s semi final clash of the Newcastle Flooring Northumberland Senior Cup against his former club Morpeth Town – and will go into the contest at Craik Park with fond memories: “I played and won the Senior Cup with Morpeth a couple of seasons ago when they beat Blyth Spartans in the final at St James’ Park,” he added, “It’s a good competition for teams to get into the final and obviously the thought of playing at the home of Newcastle United is a big incentive going into the Tuesday’s game.”

Ashington boss Nick Gray was pleased to tie up the loan deal – which is for an initial month – and was impressed with Fishburn’s first outing: “I thought Sam gave us a good presence up top today,” he said, “He had a torrid time as he got kicked all over but I thought he was a pivotal point for us. To be fair to the lad, he started the game today but had not even trained with us. Consequently, it was a bit of a risk to put him straight into the side but I didn’t really have a lot of options. I thought Sam gave a good account of himself in difficult circumstances and he will get better for us.”