BRAINTREE Town Reserves manager Lee Fisher said the arrival of Bradley Quinton as the Iron’s first-team boss has helped him retain strength in his own Thurlow Nunn League division one side.

Fisher was glad to see the Iron’s record appearance maker take the helm of the club’s senior side in Vanarama National League South and said his appointment had already had an impact on his own plans.

Fisher said: “Brad has a great background with the club and we have been speaking together as coaches.

“Brad and (assistant manager) Andy (Porter) are interested to see what we have got in our squad and they have said they will monitor it in pre-season and will take a training session with our lads.

“It’s great that they want to be involved and if we can progress players through then that’s brilliant and the fact that Brad has come in has seen a few of our players want to stay on.

“There has been interest from other clubs in a few of them, but with them knowing Brad has come in, they want to stay.

“Him coming in has helped to freshen things up.

“I know it’s not good for the club that the first team went down last year, but for us as a reserve side, it’s better to be a step closer to where the first team are as there’s more chance that we can progress players upwards.

“There are a couple of players within the squad who I have asked Brad to have a look at, just to put them on his radar.

“He has said he will take a training session with the reserves for us and it will be a chance for our lads to get seen.”

Fisher said he and his fellow joint-manager Luke Nash had kept the core of the side that finished eighth in division one last year together, with a few additions as they looked to push on from last season’s eight-place finish.

He added: “We have retained quite a few from last year as we felt they deserved to show that they could continue developing and we have also got a few more experienced ones in as well.

“We’re talking 24 to 25-year-olds as we want to keep a young look about the squad as that mirrors what Brad Quinton is looking to do with the first team with young hungry players.

“We finished top eight last year, but myself and Luke (Nash) have said we want top six this year.

“There are some big teams who have gone up last year and we feel we can compete as well as we did in the second half of last season.”

Fisher added that his players would be returning for pre-season training on June 22 and he was pleased with the schedule he had lined up ahead of the start of the campaign in August.

He added: “We have four games against sides from the level above us so that will test us and we’ll really see where we are.”