Shrewsbury Town urged to get cracking
Bullish manager Micky Mellon wants Shrewsbury Town to be 'like the Harlem Globetrotters' next season as he looks to challenge the League One big guns.
Mellon has made a statement of intent by snaring seven of his list of nine 'first pick' targets.
It comes after signing Olly Lancashire, Louis Dodds, Gary Deegan, Antoni Sarcevic, Ryan McGivern, AJ Leitch-Smith and Jim O'Brien.
All seven have third-tier experience and are 28 or under so should only get better as they approach their peak years.
And boss Mellon believes his summer signings will make a difference as Town look to improve on last season's 20th-place finish and brush with relegation.
He said: "I want to be here on August 6 with a team like the Harlem Globetrotters, where everyone looks at us and says 'let's get cracking' and we have loads of wins and lots of good weekends.
"I want us to have a really good pop at the teams at the top end of the league and the aim is to get closer to them. That's where I believe the club wants to be.
"I want to try to fill this stadium more and I want to be managing and coaching kids of a good age of massive energy and great power as a team people are proud of watching."
Mellon has maintained all along the players he has recruited now have been planned since January. And he's convinced they can transform the team's results.
He said: "It's not just a scatter-gun thing. It's a team we want to build that can hopefully take us to the next level.
Mellon acknowledges Town's challenge will be a testing one with former Premier League outfits Charlton and Bolton in League One next season.
Big clubs such as Sheffield United, Bradford, Coventry and are Millwall still in the division, but he is relishing the task ahead for Shrewsbury.
He said: "There are a lot of massive clubs and the challenge is there for Shrewsbury.
"It was huge last season. Everyone wants the same thing and that's to be competitive and that's what we're going to try to be.
"I don't want to be defeatist and say 'that's a hard ask.' We're trying to overcome all the things there for us logistically, such as enticing better players in the division and selling that to them.
"That's why we've got to keep improving to make the club better."
