Video interview: I’ll stick with Doncaster vows Dickov

Dickov has been left to effectively pick up the pieces after lining up a number of players ahead of the expected takeover to join the club, only to now be hastily revert to Plan B with a much-reduced playing squad just a few weeks to go until the start of the Football League season.

Similar problems last season saw the Rovers chief forced to scramble around for signings in the build-up to last season, with the scenario this time around much worse with his squad wafer-thin and a host of senior players having left with more set to follow.

Dickov has confirmed that he will not play Richie Wellens for the rest of the pre-season programme, with the key midfielder likely to activate a relegation release clause, aliong with Paul Quinn.

Club stalwart James Coppinger, who had verbally agreed a deal if the takeover went ahead, is also expected to have played his last game for the club.

Several players remain on trial including forward Nathan Tyson, but Dickov has confirmed that another trialist, former Leeds United keeper Jamie Ashdown, will not be joining the club.

Categorical about his own future being at Doncaster, he said: “I am a lot tougher than a lot of people think. It’s a challenge here, but it’s one that I am up for.

“I love being here and love working with everybody involved at the club. It (leaving) has never crossed my mind.

“There’s been a little bit of disruption over the past week, but you deal with it and get on with it.

“Through no-body’s fault really (here), we are left in the situation where the takeover fell through, which nobody was expecting.

“But I had a long meeting with Terry (Bramall) and David Blunt on Tuesday and the budget has been set for me and as a club, you deal with it and move on.”

On the takeover collapse, he added: “I think it was a shock for everybody as talks had been going on for a long time and the completion date had been set and press conferences held. But it didn’t happen.

“It’s a difficult situation. I’m not going to lie. But as a manager you deal with it and make sure everyone sticks together as from the outside looking in, it looks as if it’s an unstable club. But it isn’t.

“We have to be positive and move on together now.”

On Wellens, he said: “The situation with Richie is that like a lot of players, he’s had to take a drop in wages because of relegation. He has a release clause that he can activate until the 31st of August as has Paul Quinn.

“For me, preparing for the season now, it’s going to be very difficult now involving Richie or Paul in the games we have got coming forward.

“Richie was my captain last year and someone I have known for a long time. But looking to the future, if say for instance Richie played in the friendlies against Sheffield Wednesday and Rotherham, he might then get a phone call to activate his clause and go somewhere else.

“When players have clauses, you have to plan without them.”

#LeonWobYP