MALVERN Town are almost there with their squad building for 2025/26, as the side look to go one better than last year's play-off final loss and clinch promotion to step three.
At this point, Malvern have officially announced the retention of 12 members of last year's squad in Miles Ferguson, Charlie Johnson, Dion Molyneux, Joe Tumelty, Matt Macdonald, Curtis Smith, Joe Bullock, Levi Francis, Alex Bell, Sam Clark, Ben Hayes and Ryan Brunt.
Twinned with this The Hillsiders have also announced three signings to this point - bringing in goalkeeper Seth Locke from Bristol Manor Farm, alongside a pairing from Hartpury - wing back Ben Baxter and midfielder Luke Salter.
"There is one more signing to be announced this week," said manager Lee Hooper.
"There is still a couple that we are speaking to and are on our radar but I think we are nearly there with retained players and recruitment.
"We are not far away. We are always looking if anyone becomes available but we're not going to be actively looking - I think we have covered areas we need to and we are nearly where we want to be."
No players have been turned away from the squad, with everybody that wanted to stay being invited back for next season - along with the three signings announced to this point.
"We knew we needed a keeper first and foremost in Seth," added Hooper.
"It was one of our priority signings and Seth was that.
"We tried to sign him previously and we got him this year which was great for us. Last year I think we went through four keepers across the season which wasn’t ideal – it was important that for this season we had someone in there regularly playing week-in, week-out.
"The other two lads that have been announced have got the promotion with Hartpury, very talented players with a lot of ability, a way of playing that fits into our mould and a mindset that fits into our mould.
"They will learn quickly, they are willing to learn and they will fit what we are trying to. Fill the gaps from losing a couple of players and where we think we need to strengthen our squad depth in quality."
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Being last season's top goal scorers and having been a forward himself, Hooper is aiming to continue playing with a front-foot mentality next season.
"We have always been an attacking team, even when we have set up defensively we have still scored goals," he explained.
"If you can be really good at your strengths, which for us is attacking and scoring goals, and then you can make marginal improvements and keep getting better at the other stuff – which for us is keeping the ball out of our net – then we will be standing in a good place off the back of last season."
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