Leyton Orient boss Richie Wellens is still looking to bolster his squad but admits they might not get any more bodies in the building before Saturday’s League One opener against Wanderers.
The new campaign gets under way at Brisbane Road and Wellens has pinpointed a couple of areas where the O’s are currently light in numbers.
“I think we need a couple,” he told the club channels after Saturday’s friendly win against Dagenham and Redbridge.
“If you look at our bench today, Jordan Graham could break down at any time and we are just going to have to manage him knowing that Theo (Archibald) is not going to be back until January.
“DJ (Diallang Jaiyesimi) and Ollie (O’Neill) can play on the left, Sonny Perkins can play on the left and was very good when he went on the right.
“I would like someone who can play on the right to give us more options and I would like another midfield player.”
The manager added: “Whether we get them in for the start or not… but I would imagine we may have a couple more in the next two to three weeks.”
Wellens’ side finished 11th last season and the 44-year-old hopes they can make a positive start against Wanderers this weekend, although he is expecting a tough test.
“If you look at Bolton’s pre-season, they have played against Fiorentina, Middlesbrough and Stoke so the opposition they have played are really high level,” he added.
“I think Bolton are a really good team, very consistent, quite set in their ways and a really exciting team to watch. They are difficult to play against.
“I am going to try to run with it where we get two strikers on the pitch because I do believe that (Charlie Kelm and Dan Agyei) can both get double figures easily this year and maybe get up towards 20 goals.”
The O’s wrap up their pre-season schedule against Cheshunt tonight, although Wellens plans to manage minutes to make sure there is no fatigue come Saturday.
“The players who need minutes will play,” he explained. “We will take it as a serious game, I will be there. It won’t a youth game or anything like that.
“We will speak to the players and see how they feel. The most important thing is the preparation for the week.
“We will make sure that we train twice on the pitch which will give us good visuals and distances about what we are going to do in the first game of the season.
“We will make sure the players don’t run into fatigue where it spoils our training week but some of them will have minutes.”
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