First in a series of front page pieces to fill in time between now and the start of the season, when there’s no real news of course…

With the most important piece of the jigsaw now in place, in the shape of Jimmy Mullen, it’s time for Walsall to be putting together the rest of the puzzle.

While there’s no shortage of off-field staff, with perhaps the exception of an assistant to Jimmy, or a first team coach (either/or would be nice), on field the Saddlers would appear to be in a state of disarray, with a whole host of positions clamouring to be filled by half-decent, keen players looking to carve a niche out for themselves at the Banks’s Stadium.

Mullen’s first task is to instil some sort of confidence in the playing squad he has left - and one free tip we can offer him is that talk of ‘punching above your weight’ and ‘miracles’ will land him in a whole heap of trouble with the fans. Once he’s persuaded them to hang around for another season or more, he’ll have to find some new team-mates for them to play with, unless we downsize to the local indoor 5-a-side competition, which the squad ought to walk through without breaking a sweat.

A supposed advantage of Mullen’s lack of recent league experience will be that he has Paul Taylor at his beck and call, and the tanned one will no doubt have been busy running his expert eye over no shortage of talent, both domestic and foreign. We look forward to the preseason friendlies, where we can play ’spot the triallist’ with anyone wearing Saddlers’ shirts 5-11 on the pitch.

One thing’s for certain - expectations are certainly at least as low as they were this time last year, although, perhaps bizarrely, our odds of survival at the bookies have improved. It’s up to Mullen to raise the bar if Jeff Bonser’s Championship dream is to be realised.