Match Thread Stevenage

Quoted from Maringer

I'm not too concerned about what happened in the January window. It's generally thin pickings then, unless you've got a lot of money to spend and Lloyd turned out to be a decent signing (albeit on loan) and Emmanuel has been OK as well. If we'd managed to sign Hopper and he'd ended up with the same return as Lloyd, we'd have been happy enough.

With more preparation time this year, we'll hopefully see the signings we need to strengthen and push on next season.

It will be interesting to see how Hurst plans us to line up next season. I suspect we'll be back to a back four, unless there is really major surgery to the squad, but the bulk of the defence is under contract, I believe. I suppose you could say that we have at least got a good deal of experience playing with 5 in defence so we could see chopping and changing again next season.

As usual, I expect to see us sign a load of players I've never heard of before.

Quoted from GrimPol

Will Hurst be at GTFC next season?

Quoted from Poojah

There’s no doubt that circumstances this summer are drastically more favourable than last year - we have 89 days between our last and first games, versus only 54 the in 2022. Factor in that we’ve realistically known what division we would be in for months, and it’s a totally different equation.

We know by now that Hurst, though by no means perfect, is a very solid manager who will utilise his budget shrewdly, and our budget next season should be comfortably the biggest in real terms than it has been for many, many years. My hopes and expectations are absolutely in terms of pushing for promotion in some way, shape or form.

But then you do need to take a step back and consider who else will have similar aspirations. We will of course be up against media darlings Wrexham, who will blow everyone out of the water financially, but the money doesn’t stop there. We will also be in League Two with at least 5 or 6 of the following:

Stockport
Bradford
Salford
Mansfield
Swindon
Forest Green
MK Dons
Notts County

That’s up to 9 clubs who will almost certainly have a tangibly larger budget than us, and I’m probably missing another couple of less obvious examples.

I’m not trying to make pre-emptive exclusives; I have no agenda other than wanting us to do well. But like the version of the National League we found ourselves in two years ago, next year’s League Two table is going to be unusually well heeled. I think we’ll see the biggest real terms spending of any League Two season ever, in totality.

I’m still very optimistic, we overcame a string of richer adversaries to win promotion back to the league last year. But it’s also important to be objective; we’re not the only club that will feel promotion is the aim next season and certainly not the club with the fattest wallet.