It’s that time of the season where players take a well earned break. But from a recruitment point of view it can be the busiest time of the year.
Retained & released lists have been announced and the competition for signing players begins.
The first part of this recruitment process is retention. Although it sounds easy to most, Keeping your current players at your own club takes planning and preparation. We remain in negotiations with some players but as you have probably seen, a number of the players that our management team looked to retain have decided that their futures lies elsewhere.
Sometimes a player’s valuation & a club’s valuation can be worlds apart so we have to admit defeat in certain areas and move on if we feel it isn’t in the best interests of the club. We can’t bow down to unrealistic demands. Once that retention is all confirmed then we can move on to our main transfer targets.
The players we have identified are ones that will suit the manager’s philosophy & playing style plus the demands of this league and the problems it brings. Players that will be comfortable on our new 3G surface moving forward were also taken into consideration.
This stage of the recruitment process is vital. I’m in constant dialogue with agents offering a wide range of players from all over the UK, that said we have our own targets that we have identified over a number of months, We can’t move away from those if we want to be successful.
We want players that can play at the level that we are at but also players that we believe can play at the next level and beyond especially with the demands that a club like Bury has. We want players to grow with the club and become fan favourites.
Recruiting the players that can handle the crowd and the expectations takes a lot more preparation than you would believe. Taking everything into consideration we have basically had to build a brand new squad that we believe suits Bury FC as a whole.
We don’t want to have a large playing squad. Quality over quantity is the way forward so our fans can start to identify with the players and the team can have an identity of its own. We look forward to the new season and the challenges it brings. We know how difficult the league is and we won’t underestimate anyone.
Thanks for your continued support as always.
Jimmy.
