What Bradford City manager Graham Alexander had to say on the League Two club's playing budget in 2024-25

City face a sixth campaign in the fourth tier next term, with owner Stefan Rupp revealing late last month that he would inject more funds to enable the club to have 'a closer fight with teams at the top end of the table next season' following concerns from CEO Ryan Sparks about this year’s playing budget.

The club have started recruitment plans already for the next campaign, with Alexander, new head of football operations David Sharpe, head of recruitment Stephen Gent and head of academy Mark Litherland recently meeting to discuss the future of players whose deals expire in June.

Sign up to our new Sports Editor’s TeamTalk newsletter available this week

On next season’s budget, Alexander, whose mid-table side visit Walsall on Saturday, said: “It’s difficult to have a set figure at this stage because obviously our season-ticket sales go into that. We don’t know where that will finish up.

"We have a lot of contracted players for next season. Will they all be here? We don’t know.

"We don’t know what we’ll bring in with player sales or trades and people moving on.

"It’s a fluid figure but certainly one we feel will be competitive in next season’s division.

"We’ve got a few estimates about what other clubs will have. That’s been communicated to me.

"There have been assurances that it will be a budget that will allow us to compete against the better teams in this division – or what that division might look like.

"It’s not just about having the finance but spending it wisely. If we do that, then we’ll be a competitive team at the right end of the table.

"There’s a lot of hard work that has to go into that as well."