AFC Fylde boss Dave Challinor believes the Coasters must ‘hold their nerve’ during the summer transfer window.

Fylde brought in their first signing of the off-season with a swoop for former Gateshead captain Neill Byrne, but Challinor admits the club may have to play a waiting game to get their top targets. 

“It’s been slow,” admitted Challinor. “We are looking at the right players, but quite a few names on our list have already been snapped up by Football League clubs, or Scottish Premiership clubs which has become a pool for players looking to put themselves into the shop window.

“The players we want are in high demand. We have to be patient and I’m sure that better players will become available as the summer goes on.

“We may have to wait until perhaps League clubs have spent their budgets and we then become an option for those higher quality players.

“We have to hold our nerve. Obviously we would love it all to be sorted by the first day of pre-season but that is never going to be the case.

“We have to stay confident that certain players will be come available at some point. We will be looking at loan players too, which have been very successful for us in the past. 

Unfortunately we aren’t in a position where we can offer whatever we want for players.” 

Whilst working around the clock to put together his squad for next term, Challinor is also hopefully of retaining his stars from last season.

“We’ve had nothing for our players. We only have seven contracted at the moment and we have had nothing for those players as of yet. 

“As daft as it sounds, I hope there are phone calls for our players because there should be interest considering how some of them performed. 

“It will depend on where the interest is coming from and how serious it is before we make any decisions. 

“We would only let someone go if we had a ready-made replacement lined up. 

“I hope people have taken notice of what we did last year, but I don’t anticipate being forced into selling any of the players we have currently. 

“We want to add to the group and aim to be better than we were last year and even more equipped for success.”