Barnsley: Heckingbottom calls for help with Reds recruitment

Barnsley head coach Paul Heckingbottom has revealed he has become increasingly frustrated by the transfer window.
Paul HeckingbottomPaul Heckingbottom
Paul Heckingbottom

Before tomorrow’s clash at Aston Villa, he has called for the club to appoint a recruitment specialist to help him sign new players.

“We’ve got to have someone better than me doing it,” he said. “Sometimes I wonder whether my time is better spent doing other things.

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“You should constantly be getting better. We think we’ve been brilliant at recruitment and we’ve signed some really good players, but I know, 100 per cent, that we need to be better.

“We’ve got to be better. It’s hard when you know that you’re responsible for the team and you’re only seeing little video clips of players.”

Heckingbottom signed striker Kieffer Moore from Ipswich Town last week.

The Star understands the club’s owners, a consortium headed by Chinese billionaire Chien Lee, have made funds available to Heckingbottom.

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The 40-year-old is keen to make as many permanent signings as he can.

“It’s (the window) been hard work,” he said,“We’ve got to come out of it in a better place than when we went into it. That’s everyone’s challenge,” added Heckingbottom.

“We’re on track, but there are people we’d have loved to have brought in who we’ve missed out on.”

“I’d love to have our own signings. If it’s going to be loans, then you’re reliant on Premier League clubs or whoever letting players go. That’s usually what makes everything happen towards the end of the window.

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“If we bring in a lot of loans again then it becomes another fire-fighting exercise where we’re plugging gaps. We don’t want that.

“Eventually we want to bring in our own players, work with them and stop other clubs profiting from our good work.”