Assistant manager admits that it is rare for us to acquire top picks.

Neil Baker has told the club’s official web-site that recruitment has become even harder with most Football League clubs vastly improving their scouting networks to cover the lower leagues, the Conference and the lower regions of non-league football.

Baker who helped discover the likes of Luke Varney, John Brayford, Steve Jones and Justin Cochrane from the non-league scene says players we target are now being targeted more and more by other clubs.

The club’s assistant manager told the club’s official web-site: “Recruitment has become more difficult because clubs have improved their scouting and are after the same players. It is rare now that we get those players that are top of our list.

“It has become much harder and we have to work down our list. For example, I’ve spoken to a player’s agent recently and he is in League Two but he was asking for more than we pay our own top earner. He had no experience of playing in League One but from a league below he was asking to automatically become our highest earner. That is what you are dealing with.

“I thought our recruitment was fairly reasonable last season. Marcus (Haber) had an indifferent season, but he improved and I thought he had an excellent end to the season. He became the focal point of our team.

“Lauri Dalla Valle is a finisher and proved that in the last couple of months. He had a couple of injuries at the beginning but I’m sure we will see the best of him next season.

“The loan players all helped us at some point. Greg Leigh played the most games by any loan player in the Football League and got better.

“Jamie Ness needed to become fitter and once he did, he was one of our best players. Tate made a difference to the defence with his experience and Uche and Nicky scored goals. Uche was terrific for us when he first came here and Ajose’s goals were crucial over Christmas and into the first couple of months of the New Year. “