Cook's focus on football, not contracts

Paul Cook says he's not at all worried about going into the new Football League season with question marks hanging over the future of several of his top stars.
Paul CookPaul Cook
Paul Cook

Latics are preparing for Saturday’s season-opener at MK Dons hoping to get their new manager’s reign off to a flyer.

Cook has been an extremely busy man since moving up from Portsmouth in June, offloading half a dozen players and bringing in seven - the latest being Newcastle frontman Ivan Toney on Wednesday night.

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That’s meant he’s been unable to have a proper look at the situation surrounding the Wigan players who are entering the final 12 months of their contract - which include playmaker Michael Jacobs and star striker Will Grigg.

But Cook says he’s content to solely concentrate on the opening few games of the campaign, and let the contract situation take care of itself in due course.

“We’re very, very conscious of who’s going into the last year of their contract, and who’s not,” Cook told the Wigan Post.

“One of the things the chairman’s done in the past, to back his manager, is perhaps give some lads contracts that have been too long, that they shouldn’t have been given.

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“But that’s down to me and the staff now, to help the chairman.

“Certainly we know who is in the last year of their contracts, and the big effort is nurturing the squad into the start of the season.

“Once we start the season, with the squad we want in place, we can start to look at lengths of contracts.

“And I’m sure once we get into August, September, October, you’ll start to see some movement on that score.”