‘Believe you me’ – Doug King addresses Coventry City summer recruitment plans

Coventry City transfer news from CoventryLive as club owner Doug King provides an update on his plans for the summer window

Doug King has told Coventry City fans that the club is ‘on it right now’ when it comes to building a stronger squad capable of getting promoted back to the Premier League next season.

The Sky Blues owner is clearly reluctant to give too much away, having instructed manager Mark Robins and his staff to stay tight-lipped about the club’s summer business in the transfer window, but revealed he’s had plenty of calls come his way already as he looks to build on the existing squad.

City fell short of the play-offs this time around, largely due to a lack of strength in depth to cope with the fixture schedule and injuries, and King admits it will continue to be a balancing act moving forwards as Coventry – like all Championship clubs – continues to operate at a loss.

Asked in terms of the transfer kitty over the summer, how big a squad is going to be needed after releasing Liam Kelly, Simon Moore, and also what’s the latest on Callum O’Hare (who has been offered fresh terms but is expected to leave on a free transfer), King told BBC CWR: “As I say to our manager and staff, ‘no comment.’

“Look, what will be will be. We’ve increased our recruitment team meaningfully. I see their work and what they do. I see the areas we are now covering and the depth of the analysis we are going into.

“We fell slightly away this season, had a cup run that was quite draining, for sure, the way it went. We know all those situations and we want to be competitive. The issue with real depth in anything is that if there’s too much depth, too many players, then that obviously adds to your wage bill and they may not play. The issue is they may play if you have lots of injuries.”

The executive chairman pointed to a number of ways the club are actively trying to keep the players fit, adding: “We’re trying to reduce injuries. We have all the same three pitches now (at the stadium and Ryton) and we know the hardness of them and are monitoring everything very carefully.

“We have appointed a performance director in Claire-Marie Roberts to really make sure that we don’t have, or try to minimise injuries and increase our strength and conditioning.”

As for new signings, he said: “The players next year… Look, I want us to get promoted. I am an ambitious man and I look at everything properly and if we can get our squad built on from the foundations and nucleus we have today in a great way then we will get on with it. And we are on it right now, believe you me. I have got way too many calls coming my way.

“So we’re chatting about it and we’re on it, and I want to tell the Sky Blue Army and all our fans that we have been here for 15 months or so and had a couple of great experiences. We haven’t quite got to where we want to get to but we are going to try our hardest to do that.”

He added: “We took over Wembley and showed to everybody what Coventry is about, who supports Coventry and how much passion they have for it and we just want to continue to build on that and take us to the next step.”

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