Blues boss Paul Jewell has revealed that contract talks have begun with midfielder Lee Martin. The former Manchester United man’s current terms are up at the end of next season.
Jewell said: "The owner has spoken with his agent and we’re trying to tie Lee down to a new deal. We hope that can be sorted in the near future.
"But if it’s not sorted in the near future, we can’t afford to let players run out of contract. But we want to keep Lee Martin.”
Martin isn’t the only player whose deal is up next summer but Jewell says he’s the only one who has been spoken to so far: "Lee is at that age, he’s 25, and we want to sign him. We don’t want to let players that we want to keep let their contracts run out.”
In addition to Martin, Jack Ainsley, Jimmy Bullard, Damien Delaney, Andy Drury, Nathan Ellington, Arran Lee-Barrett, Jaime Peters, Ryan Stevenson, Joe Whight and Cormac Burke all have deals which are up at the end of June 2013, while skipper Carlos Edwards, Jason Scotland, Ronan Murray and Luke Hyam have all signed new one-year contracts within the last few months.
Speaking in April, Martin, who is currently sidelined with a minor thigh problem, said he was keen to get his contract situation "sorted nice and early”.