Steve Cooper
What’s the latest with Brennan Johnson?
He’s hopefully back training next week. He’s working very hard, he’s doing long days, he’s really committed to his rehab and his recovery. He’s as frustrated as anybody not to be a part of pre-season, because he’ll want to be ready as quickly as possible. We hope he’ll be back next week. It’s going to plan in terms of his recovery.
It’s a frustrating one, in that he did it with Wales and the timescale of telling us what happened, but like I said we are dealing with how he is and fingers crossed he’ll be back with us on the grass next week.
Anthony Elanga made an exciting first impression…
Clearly the objective, for every club, is to be a better team and squad than last season. We want to do better than last season, and to do that you need a better team and squad. That’s what we’re trying to do. We have brought a couple of players in, Anthony being one, which we’re delighted about.
We’re looking forward to working with him. He’s got a lot of potential, he has a young mind which wants to do well. He is a fantastic athlete and we’re looking forward to working with him, but hopefully it’s the start – the boys who have come in – of a number of players that we need to bring in. To do better than last year, we need to improve the squad.
Ola Aina is through the door – how far away is he?
It was too soon for Ola and Morgan [Gibbs-White] to play. They’ve only done a couple of sessions so it wasn’t a risk worth taking. They’ll for sure feature against PSV on Sunday, it’ll be good to get them involved – for Morgan back involved, for Ola it’ll be the first time. It’s what we need, a stronger team and squad than last season. The more players we can bring in and be available too, the better chance it’ll give us.
We have to. It’s clear that we have to. Everybody knows that. The club is joined up and working together, but we need to do better than last season and to do that we have to improve the starting line-up and the changes we can make. That’s the hope, we have to bring players in and hopefully it’s sooner rather than later.
How far away are you generally from where you want to be with your squad?
There are still a few weeks left, and there’s work to do of course, otherwise what’s the point of having the timescale of pre-season that you have? Clearly we need to add players. Some players have returned from injury.
For me that’ll be the biggest factor in helping us get to where we need to be – and that’s a better outfit than last year. Certainly work to do with recruitment and bringing players in. Sooner rather than later hopefully.
How are you approaching the next week?
We have a couple of days now before PSV. We have a plan in place, we stuck to the minutes tonight. The only player who played less was Taiwo because he had to come off with his ankle. Scott McKenna was due to start and fell ill before the game, so they were the two who didn’t get what we wanted, everyone else did.
We’ll just stick to the plan in terms of the next couple of days and also what we plan for PSV. Like I said, a couple of players can come into the squad – Morgan, Ola – and we’ll try and pick the right minutes for the right players.
Did you take Taiwo off as a precaution?
Not really. He’s had a kick on his ankle, but we don’t think it’s anything too serious, but at the same time he wasn’t able to continue.
What’s the latest with Omar Richards?
Omar has been out for a long time, and we’re still transitioning him into, not so much training, but match minutes. We have to continue to be patient with him and hopefully he can have a bit of luck.
