Roeder To Sign More Players

Last updated : 10 January 2002 By Mike Reich
Roeder: More players coming in
Despite reports from Glenn to the contrary, it would seem that there are more funds for transfers available for the club to spend, without selling any players.

This doesn't come as too much of a surprise though. Imagine what would have happened if Glenn had not been a success - the board would have to replace him with a better manager, and would need some transfer funds with which they could entice a replacement.

Having seen that Glenn is up to the job, they have obviously felt that now is the right time to release the funds for Glenn to use.

The amount available is unclear, but I would imagine that he has around £3m at his disposal, of which £1m has gone to Sparta for Vladimir.

Glenn told the official site: "We needed to add him to our squad now; I have got a number of players on four bookings and I am very hopeful Vladimir is going to be the first of at least three, so somewhere in the next week or two we are going to be adding to the squad again at least twice more."

Glenn confirms that the money is only going out at this time, with no planned sales: "I'm not expecting too much movement on the outgoing side; I can't possibly do that because I haven't got the numbers."

Unfortunately, this means that we will have to hang on to the fringe players who aren't up to the standard. The likes of Titi Camara, who recently announced his intention to stay on at the club to collect all his money before quitting football altogether. Or Gary Charles, whose performances for the club have been few and far between, and less than inspirational when called upon.

"Irrespective of what happens we need to hopefully to get two more in in the next two weeks; I have targeted two or three players that we want to bring in and with hard negotiation maybe we will be able to do that.

"To all intents and purposes there is little if no money to spend so we really are having to work hard on the negotiating side, which I don't mind - I never want to be seen to pay over the odds for anybody.

"The way I have been brought up us as a person is that you never pay the asking price anyway; you negotiate hard and get the price down, and we need to do that at the moment because we have very little money to spend in the transfer market.

"Let's hope there is still room for manoeuvre and we can get another two players in to give the squad a little bit of strength in depth, which we just haven't got."

The jury is obviously still out on Labant, but he certainly sounds as though he is up to the task. Let's hope that transfers number 7 and 8 prove a success too.