Just champion '“ Allen explains why he wanted midfielder at the Proact

The midfielder joined Chesterfield last week, having rejected a new contract at Barnet, where he won the National League with Allen.

Allen doesn’t just want experienced players in his Spireites side, he wants players with experience of winning.

The 31-year-old’s habit of bursting forward from midfield also played a part in his move to Chesterfield.

Allen said: “He’s very reliable, very mobile, he gets forward to support the front players and goes behind, which we all know is crucial in any team.

“You can’t just have players standing on the halfway line passing the ball in pretty patterns.

“He’s the absolute model professional, he will be the fittest person at the club, he knows how I work and how I want our team to play, he’s very experienced.”

Allen announced Weston’s arrival in a press release that simply read: “He’s a champion.”

The boss was not trying to be funny or glib.

“When I wrote that one word, champion, and didn’t say anything else, there was a big meaning to that,” he said.

“It’s important that we’ve got players who have tasted it and felt it and know what it’s like.

“That’s the reason I used that one word.

“Hopefully most people got the message of why I wrote that word.”

Weston was a major contributor to Barnet’s National League title success in the 2014/15 campaign and that evidently left an impression on Allen, who also managed the player late last season at the Hive.

“In that season when we won the league, in the last nine games he got five goals,” said the manager.

“When the going got tough, he stood up.”