No issues between Neal Ardley and Mitch Hancox after York City exit

Hancox joined Hartlepool earlier this week after just three substitute appearances all season, struggling for game time in a large City squad.

Ardley wished Hancox all the best, and opened up on his plans to bring in permanent signings in the coming weeks.

“It’s like many of the players who aren’t part of the plans, you have honest conversations with people," Ardley explained.

"You pick your team that give you the best chance to win the game, and everyone has different opinions.

"That’s the beauty of my job, everyone has an opinion on it.

"Mitch and his agent, his agent was pestering me on Sunday about how they’ve got a deal and they want to go, blah, blah.

"If you can’t give them playing time and don’t feel like you are going to straight away, then you have to do the right thing by the player and Mitch wants to play football.

"Fair play to him, just like Ryan Whitley, Mitch wants to play football and isn’t in our plans.

"I’ve got 30 or however many players, I need to trim the squad, there’s no good in me having 20 players training here and eight players who can’t even train in that.

"I’ve got players coming back from injuries now, we need to train the squad, we need to refine the squad and have possibly a 24-man squad going forward.

"There will be some players who have to go out, even if I do bring in a few.

“There’s a couple that have enquired about one or two on loan, but nobody who has been on top of the first team.

"It is what it is, I can assure you that me and the chairman has sat down and we have got a process and a plan in place, we’ve looked at the fixtures coming out and need to be careful.

"You’ve got to be competitive and need to add to the squad to be really competitive, trying to bring in permanent, trying to bring in players that can make a difference and players that you’ll be happy if they’re here in the Summer and you want to go forward with."