No 'haphazard' transfer policy this summer, says Wray (From Swindon Advertiser)

SWINDON TOWN: No 'haphazard' transfer policy this summer, says Wray

6:00am Thursday 14th June 2012 in STFC News

Paolo Di Canio has "learnt quickly" according to Jeremy Wray

SWINDON Town’s transfer policy this summer will create less “fallout” over the coming campaign, according to interim chairman Jeremy Wray.

The club’s scattergun approach to recruitment this time last year saw players spinning through the County Ground’s revolving door at a remarkable rate, with many failing to make the grade under manager Paolo Di Canio in the long run.

That forced the Robins boss to make several changes to his squad over the course of the season, something Wray is confident will not happen with a full 12 months of experience under the Italian’s belt.

He said: “I think it’s no secret that, when he came in last year, at the time there was very little time to put a squad together.

“We were going into pre-season and there were still players coming in on trial, there were rumours every day of players coming in from countries all around the world and a lot of those were true - a lot of them were targeted and some of them were arriving and quickly sent back again.

“It was a bit haphazard last year and everybody knows that. He was in at short notice and he was quickly trying to put a squad together and it was a very fast learning curve for him as to what was required.

“He learnt that incredibly quickly and realised that some of the mud that had stuck against the wall was good, some of it was wrong and addressed that and clearly addressed that successfully because we got where we needed to get to in the end.

“It was a fairly random approach - the people who were recruited at the beginning of last season weren’t the result of a steady progress over previous months of watching lots and lots of games and narrowing those targets down, because Paolo had just come on board.

“The truth was, at that stage, we did not have the ideal amount of time to rebuild in a coherent and logical way, which if we had would probably have led to less fallout than we’ve had over the last season.”

Town are unlikely to officially announce the first of their summer signings until next week, although it is expected that three or four new players will be with the squad ahead of the pre-season trip to Italy on July 1.

In the meantime, Wray and Di Canio have to begin the process of finding new clubs for those players deemed surplus to requirements for 2012/13.

“We’ve obviously got to tidy that up now in terms of recognising what is required, being honest enough with the people who, in his opinion, maybe aren’t good enough to go again - and on that basis we’ve got to find suitable replacements,” said Wray.

“Where we are now, most of that work has been done but there are still going to be contracted players, players you haven’t got any problem with at all, that you are just saying to: ‘Realistically, if we are being honest about pushing to Championship level, we need Championship-style players who are good enough to get us out of League One at the first attempt’.

“That’s down to Paolo and his assessment.”