‘Every minute matters’ for Darren Moore as Doncaster Rovers prepare for kick-off

“Every single minute matters now,” says manager Darren Moore as he tries to cram as much work as he can into his League One players “without breaking them”.

Yesterday Doncaster’s squad was allowed to train as a group for the first time since the coronavirus put them in mothballs in March, and the key dates for the new season were confirmed. The first of six planned pre-season friendlies will be against Scunthorpe United tomorrow.

Moore will now step up his recruitment drive, with Stoke City goalkeeper Josef Bursik high on his list, but he has not given up hope that some of those who made such an impression in 2019-20 might, despite indications at the moment, be back after all.

“Now things are moving and we can start planning,” said Moore in a Zoom press conference.

“Every single minute matters now because time is so limited in terms of trying to get as much as we possibly can out of the players without breaking them. We’ll try and get as much out of the day as we possibly can, working on principles and dynamics.

“Next week we will really ramp it up with games and double sessions to get as much information into them as possible.

“Whereas we were planning for September 12 (League One’s opening day), now we’re planning for the fifth (officially earmarked yesterday for the first round of the League Cup).

“When the season does start it’s midweek games for the foreseeable future. They want to get through as many fixtures as possible because they don’t know what the winter months are going to be like.

“We’ve got to have versatility and depth because physically it’s going to be demanding on the players coming back in after nearly five months off and hitting six weeks of pre-season then trying to hit the ground running.”

With Timothy Dieng back at Queens Park Rangers and Ian Lawlor loaned to Oldham Athletic, a goalkeeper is high on Moore’s shopping list. Despite being a year younger than Louis Jones, 20-year-old Bursik could offer greater experience on loan.

“He’s one of the names on the list,” acknowledges Moore. “It’s not just him.

“We’ve identified one or two players but the hardest bit is just getting them over the line. We want to bring them in now because we want to try and integrate them straight away.

“I’ve not really pushed it before because we wanted to keep the group small to limit the risk but now we are trying to push hard to add to that and I’d like to say we’re close because we’ve identified them (targets) and had talks with clubs about these players.”

Having turned down “multiple” bids for Ben Whiteman, Moore is not resigned to losing the midfielder, or even writing off bringing back Matty Blair, who ran his contract down this summer.

“We’ve got a real top, top midfield player here who we believe is getting even better,” says a bullish Moore of Whiteman.

“He signed a new contract last season and we’ve shown a clear statement that we believe in him.

“He’s a wonderful man, a level-headed player, he gets it and he’ll go about his job in the right manner. If there’s a team interested he understands what they’ve got to get to (to sign him) so it won’t disrupt him.”

On Blair, he said: “I believe he’s been looking elsewhere for next season. I don’t hear of him going anywhere at the moment so he’s still out there as a free agent.

“I don’t hold anything against Matty. He’s too much of a good man, a good person and a good player. I understand the dynamics of football, I get it.”

Rovers made good use of the loan market last season, but when players do too well, they are unlikely to be back.

“With them being their first loans and because they did as well as they did, their clubs feel they’re more than capable of operating at a higher level,” says Moore of last season’s intake. “If they’re not quite given the opportunities to make that step up we’ll welcome them back.”

With the transfer window open well into October, and the hope the turnstiles might open then too, there is still plenty Moore cannot plan.

“We want to get players in as quickly as possible but it’s probably not all going to happen at once,” he says.

“We’re playing it by ear on our budget because we don’t know when the stadiums are going to open, when that revenue will be coming again on a regular basis.

“Hopefully we as a society and a nation can continue to do our bit for the health and safety of everybody so the day when we get fans in sporting stadiums comes sooner rather than later.”

Details of the warm-up games are sketchy, but Rovers are expected to play two Championship clubs, one of them twice, as well as Scunthorpe and Bradford City, and complete their programme against Manchester United Under-23s on September 1.

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