Mansfield Town

Boss indicates that a new face could be added to the squad in the next few days.

Manager Paul Cox is hopeful that a loan signing could be made to bolster our squad in the next couple of days.

Our boss, who was speaking at today’s press conference, wouldn’t be drawn on the name of the player, but it is expected that he will be able to operate in more than one position.

He said: “I’ve kind of agreed everything and all it needs now is just a yes or no from the club. It’s not rocket science to work out where we need to bring people in.

“The quality of player and the players we’ve got here are undoubted. Now we just need a go ahead from the top to say yes it can happen or no it can’t.”

Meanwhile, there is some positive news on the injury front as playmaker Fergus Bell, who fell awkwardly on his shoulder in last night’s 5-1 reserve team defeat to Derby County, didn’t suffer any lasting damage.

“The lad was brought off as a precaution and he’s in our thoughts for Saturday’s game,” confirmed Cox. “He got through 90 minutes, worked hard and I thought he looked an absolute threat in his position.

“He took a little knock [on his shoulder], but we’re not going to win any wars with him competing in a 90-minute game, so we just wrapped him up in cotton wool in order to get him through for Saturday.”

Reflecting more on the match itself, Cox said: “It was a very strong Derby County side. They had a player on loan from Atletico Madrid playing against us, whereas we had four or five of the kids in there.

“You look at the score-line, but you have to look at the bigger picture, which is you can’t get experience unless you have experience.

“That would have been a bad experience for the kids, but a good experience in so many ways.  You never learn anything when you’re winning consistently, but sometimes when you come up against better players, bigger clubs, you learn, and the kids would have learned so much from it, even though the score-line was a poor one.”

He added: “It also got one or two players who are coming back from injury a full 90 minutes, which is good as we need all the numbers we can get for the first team squad at the minute.”

Paul Cox’s full interview is available to watch on Stags Player now. To subscribe/login, click here.