Lee Johnson admits he would love Will Fish and CJ Egan-Riley back at Hibs as he looks to 'trim the fat' off his squad and recruit quality.
Manchester United defender Fish stepped up to the plate following Ryan Porteous' exit in January and really impressed but the Easter Road side could face competition from Aberdeen to land his services again for next season. Egan-Riley was another who fitted in well and with no option to buys in either deal, the Easter Road gaffer is pushing to get both back on board for the new campaign.
A mass number of players arrived in Johnson's first campaign in charge and asked if he expects a big turnaround this time around, he said: “A lot of that will be dictated by the loans. I’d love to have Will and CJ back, as an example. They’re not our only loans but while I remember a media report suggesting we had too many loans, with some of these guys we have an option to turn it into a permanent and some we haven’t.
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"That comes into play. I’d like to keep the stability, trim the fat and use the finances well to recruit quality. I’d rather lower the numbers and have higher quality.
"Then obviously if we’ve got good young players to supplement the squad or we can rotate the loans, bring them back and one of them breaks through, we’re all laughing. I’d much rather have a smaller squad because it means there are fewer problems for me!"
The Hibees finished fifth in the Scottish Premiership table but after Celtic's Scottish Cup success they will get a crack at Europe.
The men from Leith will enter the Europa Conference League at the second qualifying stage and would need to successfully negotiate three rounds to reach the tournament proper.
Johnson knows he will have interest in a number of his stars and fringe men over the window but admits ideally he would love to keep his core strong and add quality around it.
He added: "Clubs like Hibs have their place in the food chain, so we have to wait or we have to be calm, or we have to convince, or we have to pay more. And all those things come into it to try to achieve these loans again.
“In an ideal world I’d love to keep this core strong and then add quality – not numeracy – in and around the key areas where we think we need additions for the first team.
“There will be a lot of interest in our players both in terms of the fringe players, or the ones who perhaps haven’t had as many minutes as they might have hoped, but also the stars.”
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