Oxford United shirt worn by England hero Paul Gascoigne<\/strong><\/a>\n<\/p>\n\n Negru joined Bristol Rovers in September but arrived with a double hernia that prevented him from playing until October.\n<\/p>\n
\n Speaking about his injury, Negru said: “I love playing football, so it\u2019s been a tough and long road for me.\n<\/p>\n
\n “This injury has been a complicated one, but I\u2019m happy that I have got through it now and I can enjoy playing football and do what I love.”\n<\/p>\n
\n Negru was born in Dublin, Ireland, but holds Moldovan heritage, meaning he is eligible to play for both international teams.\n<\/p>\n
\n He began his football career at Lourdes Celtic in 2017 before making his professional debut with Shelbourne in the Ireland Premier Division in 2022 with Damien Duff\u2019s team.\n<\/p>\n
\n Duff placed a huge emphasis on defensive discipline and placed a lot of faith in Stephan Negru, showing the potential he saw in the young player.\n<\/p>\n
\n In 2023, he was signed to Oxford United, playing his debut for the team in April 2023. So far, he has played 21 times for the club across all competitions.\n<\/p>\n
\n His last appearance for United came in the 2-1 defeat at home to Leyton Orient in February 2025 before he was loaned to Salford City in 2024 and then Bristol Rovers in 2025.\n<\/p>\n
\n Negru has been described as an aggressive player with a strong old-school style.\n<\/p>\n
\n He played under Gavin Peers, his coach at Shelbourne\u2019s Under-19s, who was similarly old-school in his approach.\n<\/p>\n
\n He says his hero is John Terry and that\u2019s the type of defender that he is trying to model his game on.\n<\/p>\n
\n Irish Daily Star reporter Mark McCadden said: “Among his strengths are his physicality. He made his league debut in a very tough environment \u2013 away to Finn Harps. But he held his own against a very physical team. He is good in the air and in the tackle.\n<\/p>\n
\n “He admits himself that when it comes to the technical side of the game, he needs to improve. Issues such as concentration over 90 minutes will come with age.”\n<\/p>\n
\n This is the third loan recall for Oxford United this season after Jordan Thorniley and James Golding.\n<\/p>\n
\n Jordan Thorniley returned to United after being loaned out to Northampton Town, where he will continue his rehabilitation from injury.\n<\/p>\n
\n He joined Northampton in the summer and made 22 appearances before his injury.\n<\/p>\n
\n It was announced on Monday that Thorniley has returned to United after being loaned out to Northampton Town.\n<\/p>\n
\n Meanwhile, injured defender James Golding was recalled last week from his loan spell at Crewe Alexandra.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 23-year-old centre back is heading back to Kassam Stadium after 10 outings with the Pirates \u2014 his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":680742,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8818],"tags":[381,748,393,4884,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-680741","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bristol","8":"tag-bristol","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115855873318350757","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/680741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=680741"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/680741\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/680742"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=680741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=680741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=680741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}