‘SIGNINGS HAVE ADDED A LOT TO THE TEAM’
GRIMSBY TOWN BOSS PLEASED WITH THE PLAYERS BROUGHT IN IN JANUARY
DAVID Artell has been pleased with the impact that his January signings have made at Grimsby Town, with an eye now to how the club will attack the summer window.
The Mariners made six additions in the last window, three on deadline day, and most of them have made a noticeable impact since coming, which has helped the team progress in a certain way under Artell.
The likes of Curtis Thompson, Doug Tharme and Denver Hume have become regular starters in recent weeks and all have spoken about how well they have settled in as they look to help the club survive in League Two this term. *
Artell stated at the time of the transfer window that it was about “evolution, not revolution” in January, which has proven to be the case, but he sees a team that has improved since the moves were made and in that sense, it was a job well done on the recruitment side.
He said: “Whenever you go into a January transfer window, you just want to try and improve the team because you’re not going to be able to make revolutionary changes that change how the whole team plays. “The summer window is distinctly different in that sense, but it doesn’t work like that in January. That being said, it is clear that the players we have brought in [in January] have made a distinct impression - all of them. “We’ve got to make sure that continues because they’ve been very good and have added a lot to us as a team. Hopefully, going into the summer we can have a similarly productive transfer window but on a larger scale. We need to keep progressing because that is the aim of the game.
“When each transfer window comes around, you want to get better each time, but it doesn’t always work out that way. I do think we’ve made significant strides since pre-January.”
It is apparent the make-up of the squad will have to change some more yet before Artell has what he needs long-term to get the Mariners fighting at the other end of the table while playing a way that is easy on the eye for supporters.
For now, though, the team are hitting the short-term targets set by the coaching staff and have the focus to continue that for the rest of the current campaign as they look to finish on the right note.
Artell explained: “We’ve chunked up the games and just came to the end of a six-game chunk [before Wrexham] during which we exceeded our points target and we’ve got to go again for this final batch of games.
“We do try and bunch them together, but you’ve got to be mindful when setting targets that you don’t set the bar too low or too high to the extent that it negatively affects the mindset of the players for certain games.”