NEIL Young will snap up his eighth new signing of the summer in the next 24 hours – leaving him with just one more transfer target to pursue.

The Chester FC boss expects to tick off one of the two remaining names on his wanted list by recruiting a skilful right-winger released from a Conference club.

Although a left-back to provide competition for Chris Williams is proving more elusive, Young is delighted to have captured the majority of his top targets a full two months before the campaign kicks-off – and well within his budget.

“We’re back in training next Thursday and, apart from a left-sided defender, that should be us done,” said the Blues manager.

“It was always our strategy to be ahead of the game in terms of signing people. The groundwork of identifying players has been going on since February. It was never a case of us finishing the season and then going into the market and seeing what was out there – the players we’ve signed have been targets for a long time.

“We don’t do things on a whim but equally we’ve also signed the players we have because they fit into our budget.

“Every player we’ve brought in, apart from two, are on the same money or less money than they were last year. And the two lads who got an increase weren’t on a great deal at their old clubs.

“There are some players who we weren’t prepared to go for, in terms of the levels of finance they wanted, because we have a strict budget. This is not ‘kid in a sweet shop’. We have a professional way of doing things and we’ve got a figure we won’t go over.”

Young will not run the rule over trialists in pre-season but will give youth team duo Adam Bailey and Joe Ormrod a chance to shine.

Left-back Bailey and midfielder Ormrod will join their senior colleagues at next Thursday’s opening training session.

Young has so far arranged eight friendlies with home clashes against old Football League rivals Stockport County – managed by former Chester City caretaker boss Ray Mathias – on Saturday, July 30 (3pm) and Hyde on Tuesday, August 9 (7.30pm) the latest to be announced.

The trip to Heswall has been moved to Saturday, August 6 (3pm) from Tuesday, July 19 as Young hopes to line-up another game for that night.