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Foley Confirms Spanish Scouting Trip - Ipswich Town News

Town specialist skills coach Steve Foley has confirmed that he was in Spain scouting at the weekend, as reported by TWTD on Monday. Foley, who has a flat in Valencia, was joined on his trip by first team coach Bryan Klug with the duo watching four games at various levels during the international break.

Foley said: "We were not just looking at players for certain positions. We were taking advantage of the international break to do some research with the opening of the January transfer window in mind.

"Top clubs like Manchester United are constantly bringing in newcomers, and although our current squad is much more talented than it was 12 months ago you have to keep them on their toes.

"There was the opportunity to have a look at players in Spain and we took it, and we have made our reports.”

On Monday TWTD revealed that Foley was likely to have been the Town representative Spanish reports said was at Levante's 1-1 home draw Girona on Sunday.

Foley also attended the Valencia derby in May and made three visits to monitor training methods at Valencia CF last season with the clubs looking to forge an informal link. Fitness coach Simon Thadani recently made a similar visit.

Valencia-based Levante have undergone major financial turmoil over the last year and were relegated from La Liga last season. Legions of scouts watching their games looking for potential bargains has become the norm with Murcia, Real Sociedad, Salamanca, Alzira and NÃ stic de Tarragona all said to have been at Sunday's game along with the Blues.

Foley, 55, says Town boss Jim Magilton is amongst the best managers he has encountered in his years in the game, but admits the Northern Irishman and his staff still have work to do to make the Blues a promotion-challenging side: "I have worked under 20 managers in my playing and coaching time and Jim is in the top lot.

"He has improved positions in his first two seasons, and I am confident that he will do so again this season.

"But we do need to start getting results and to gel better than we have so far this term.”

Town appear to be particularly targeting Spain as they look for January recruits with chief executive Derek Bowden telling TWTD a fortnight ago that international scout Simon Hunt was visiting the country: "The beauty of being able to invest a little bit more in scouting and bringing Simon Hunt on board is that he spends most of his time out of the country. In fact he's in Spain today looking at some games.

"He has an ongoing brief for the next couple of months and beyond to scout players on the continent and bring them here, whether they are young players on a year-long loan or a longer period, or older players coming on permanent deals.

"It's something which will develop over time. We did quite a lot in the summer and a little bit in January, but we've really only just begun in terms of scouting potential players across the continent because we haven't had the wherewithal to do it before. Now, with Simon and his network of scouts, we have, but it's not a sprint.”

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