It came as a surprise to many Walsall fans when they were told that the players would be called back for pre-season training a month early, starting next week. New Manager Richard Money has now been explaining his thinking.

“Every manager will give their players a maintenance programme to follow during this time of the year,” said Money. “A break of seven or eight weeks between one season ending and the start of pre-season training is too long and you find that after a couple of weeks fitness levels will drop.

A lot of clubs ask their players to follow their particular maintenance programme on their own, but I have structured it more formally to give the players the opportunity to come in three mornings a week where, as a group, we will take advantage of the facilities on offer at David Lloyd Leisure.

There will be no football or running; we will concentrate purely on swimming, cycling, boxing and weights. It is vitally important that the players follow this programme and working together on it will certainly help. It also enables me to monitor at first-hand how intense pre-season training will need to be.

I want to do a lot of technique and tactical work during pre-season and don’t want to have to waste any time getting the players’ fitness levels up to the required standard. I believe that by doing things this way, it gives us every chance of being successful when the season finally gets underway.”

The new man at the helm seems to be meaning real business as he plans his assault on Division 2 next season. The past two years have seen an unfit, disorganised team fighting two disappointing battles, culminating in our eventual relegation. Kevan Broadhurst identified the problems, but was unable to do much about them, with his authority already undermined by the nature of his temporary appointment. Money now seems to have decided on his approach and it looks, hopefully, like one that should meet with greater success.

He has, for example, also signed the club up for “The Video Coach”, a coaching and analyst system that is used by a number of clubs up and down the country.

“I see The Video Coach as an essential part of the modern coaches armoury. Every game will be videoed and then we will be able to take out the bits that we need to give to the players both individually and as a team.

It will give us a clearer picture of what is required and I know that this system has been used to good effect at both Watford and Northampton Town this season, whilst this kind of thing is also very popular abroad”.