Boss Kieran McKenna says Town are continuing to work hard on adding the the four players signed this summer.

The Blues have added midfielder Jack Taylor, keeper Cieran Slicker, returning former loan striker George Hirst and on-loan forward Omari Hutchinson with CEO Mark Ashton saying last week that he expected another two or three new recruits before the end of the window.

Asked whether he would have hoped to have made more additions by this point, McKenna said: “I think you can always want but we deal in reality. As I’ve said all along, we’re working hard to improve the squad.

“We’re happy with what we have brought in, I’m happy with what we have in the building, we have a good, well-balanced squad of hungry players, who are eager to make the step up and I’m sure everyone going onto the pitch is going to know their job and do it to the best of their ability. And that goes a long way.

“But at the same time, we want to add quality to the squad and we’ll try and do that over the next few weeks, but it has to be the right players for the group for now and the right players for the club not just for the short term but also for the medium and the long.

“We want to improve in a sustainable way, we want to make good decisions for the future of the club and we’ll look to keep working to that criteria and hopefully that will result in some more good players coming in to improve the group and improve the team.

“But again, I’m really happy with the mentality and the depth and the quality that we have in the squad here as well.”

Town had probably their best ever January window bringing in free agent midfielder Massimo Luongo, Harry Clarke from Arsenal, Nathan Broadhead from Everton and Hirst the first time on loan from Leicester.

Given the strong business they did in that window, did that take some pressure off coming into the summer?

“I don’t think pressure’s the right word, to be honest,” McKenna reflected. “I think in modern football, if you’re signing off of pressure, you’re going to make a lot of bad decisions because everybody always wants new signings, there’s always a clamour at every club in the world for new signings, for new players; new players are always better than the players that you’ve got when they haven’t stepped on the pitch yet.

“You can’t look at it from a pressure point of view, you have to be calm enough and clear enough to make decisions for the good of the football club off of the plan that you’re trying to work to.

“We signed good players in January, of course, the four boys who came in all did very well and it’s great to have kept that group together this season and have those players still here ready to go and attack next season, but that didn’t affect our plan in the summer to still try and improve the squad further, and that plan’s still the same.

“Of course, the business we did in January improved the team and when you improve the team, it makes it harder to sign players to improve the team because we have better players in the team, so that reduces the pool of players who can come in and improve that team again. But that’s still something that we’re looking to do.

“I’m working hard on that, of course, Mark and the club are working very hard on that but we can’t lose sight of what we have in the building and what we have in the group and a large chunk of the focus still needs to be improving those players, improving that team.

“And for the supporters, supporting those players, getting behind those players and backing them going into a really big season and giving them all the support we need in the good days and also in the bad days, if and when we have them.”

Meanwhile, we understand there is nothing in reports linking the Blues with a move for young Manchester United defender Axel Tuanzebe.

Photo: TWTD

BeattiesBackPocket added 11:01 - Aug 5 Blueboy huge difference between us and Wednesday just listen to their fans pre season they sound like you do. They played last night like they did last season hoof ball football absolutely the same as under Moore that’s kind of football doesn’t work in the championship those teams constantly struggle. We have burnley a match up last season smashed Rotherham playing our football which is much more adaptable for this league and we’ll have lions share of the ball. We have players who are good enough and know what the championship is about already then added Hutchinson and Taylor both players who can play at this level

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