Swansea City new boy Nathan Wood's biggest asset and why Middlesbrough let him go

Swansea City completed the first bit of transfer business last week with the signing of Nathan Wood from Middlesbrough.

The move came a little bit out of leftfield, with few links to the player emerging prior to his announcement. Swansea won't mind that one bit, with under-the-radar deals prized at any level of football.

The 20-year-old joins for an undisclosed fee on a two-year deal, with the option for another 12 months, with head coach Russell Martin revealing he had been tracking the centre-back for two years.

It's fair to say Wood's departure from Boro was a tad unexpected from the Boro end too. We spoke to of to get the reaction from the Riverside and ask what type of player Martin is getting...

Wood is a really talented and promising young centre-back with excellent pedigree and exciting potential. Although he hasn't quite managed to make that full step-up to regular first-teamer at Boro, he's been on the periphery of that since his debut aged just 16. He's an England youth international and comes through a Boro academy which has a rich history of producing Premier League quality centre-backs.

He's good on the ball and an intelligent player already. In his few first-team appearances for Boro he's had good days and bad days as you might expect of someone so young. His performance last season when needing to come into the side because of injury against Nottingham Forest stands out as what Wood could be. Boro won 1-0 and Wood came into the side and slotted in seamlessly, looking far more confident than his 18 years would suggest. Nothing got past him and he was pinging some lovely balls out of defence.

Gallery: A list of Celtic's current targets and the chances we have of signing them (Read Sport)

It was a