MARK Hughes believes the arrival of Roque Santa Cruz will give his side a whole new dimension in the Premiership this season.

Having sat back for most of the summer and watched the rest of his Premiership rivals spend vast sums in the transfer market, Hughes is close to pulling off another major coup as he looks set to beat a number of clubs to the signature of the highly-rated Santa Cruz in a £3.8million deal from Bayern Munich.

And the Rovers boss, who is once again targeting the Premiership's top six, reckons the Paraguayan international can become the final piece in a jigsaw that has taken him three years to put together.

Blessed with two of the most gifted wide-men in the Premiership in David Bentley and Morten Gamst Pedersen, Hughes has spent the last 12 months scouring the globe for a proven target man to feed off his wingers' silver service.

Now the Welshman believes he has finally come up trumps with the capture of the 6ft 2in Santa Cruz, whose ability in the air is one of his main assets.

His arrival at Ewood means Hughes will be able to call on one of the most varied and potentially deadly attacking arsenals in the Premiership, with Santa Cruz, Benni McCarthy, Jason Roberts, Matt Derbyshire and Maceo Rigters all fighting for two places up front.

And though the increased competition is likely to leave the manager with a serious selection headache in the coming months, it's a problem he's delighted to have.

"It's all about having different options," said the Rovers boss.

"I've got two really good young strikers (in Matt and Maceo), who will get a lot of experience this year.

"I've also got Benni, who has great goalscoring ability, and Jason Roberts looks really strong and powerful at the moment, so he gives us real power and pace.

"But what we probably haven't got is an aerial threat when we need it, and that's what I was looking to address."

With Pedersen and Bentley providing a steady stream of crosses from the flanks, Hughes felt it made perfect sense to bring in a striker with proven aerial ability to make maximum use of their excellent service.

"We've got great quality in wide areas, and great delivery," said Hughes, who confirmed he had been tracking Santa Cruz for some time.

"If we can get people on the end of those crosses then that will help us."

Nicknamed Chico', Santa Cruz burst onto the scene as a teenager with top Paraguayan side Olimpia Asuncion, and after making his debut at the age of 16, his goals were instrumental in the club winning three domestic titles towards the end of the 1990s, which resulted in him being crowned Paraguay's footballer of the year.

At international level he was similarly successful, scoring three goals as a 17-year-old at the Copa America to finish the tournament as his country's leading scorer.

And at the Under 20 World Cup in 1999, his goalscoring form was such that the media dubbed him Baby Gol', after the legendary Argentine striker Gabriel Batistuta.

By then, pundits were starting to talk about Santa Cruz as one of the most promising young strikers on the planet, and it wasn't long before Bayern Munich paid big money to bring him to Europe.

In total, the striker, who was voted the sexiest player at the 2006 World Cup by German football magazine Kicker', spent eight years at Bayern, winning 10 trophies, including the Champions League, the Bundesliga title (four times), the German Cup (three times), and the German League Cup (twice).

However, a succession of injury problems meant he never truly achieved his full potential in Germany, where he scored 29 goals in 155 appearances.

Nevertheless, the 25-year-old remains a highly respected figure on the world stage, and he recently took the Copa America by storm again, scoring a hat-trick in Paraguay's 5-0 victory over Colombia.

Now Hughes will be hoping his latest addition can recapture that kind of form in the Premiership in the colours of Rovers.