Jon McCarthy has invited a fresh group of trialists to train with Chester FC this week and will make a decision of whether they or those who have been at the club since pre-season began have done enough to earn contracts this weekend.
Former St Johnstone and Stockport County midfielder Wade Joyce and ex-Wrexham youngster Rakim Newton are among the hopefuls to have featured in the friendlies against Sandbach United, Wigan Athletic and Altrincham.
Left-back Joe Heath, who was with the Blues during the 2013/14 season, and academy product Kevin Exell have also been involved in those games while goalkeeper Keighan Jones came on for the final stages of the draw with Altrincham.
Aaron Hassall, the Blacon teenager who is a free agent after leaving Premier League champions Leicester City, moved on after the Sandbach game while ex-TNS forward Ryan Edwards was unfortunate to suffer an ankle injury in that match after scoring.
McCarthy is comfortable that all of them have had sufficient chance to impress and plans to have a look at several more with a view to giving them a run out against Marine on Saturday.
"I like to be fair and we'll have some more coming in this week," explained McCarthy.
"We'll actually bring in another intake who will look to train with us on Monday and Tuesday but maybe not as many of them play on Wednesday against Airbus as I think that will be more of our squad but we'll look to play them on Saturday against Marine and then we will look on the Sunday to make some decisions and let people know.
"After that we've got two weeks until the start of the season and three good games so that's where we would want to go 'this is our group near enough so let's concentrate on that'.
"That's the plan and it always has been so it won't change and we'll stick with that because we've spent a lot of time on the plan and the strategy and we believe it's right."
With 18 players under contract, McCarthy wants to add at least two more to his squad with his priority to strengthen his forward options, however there is the possibility of bringing in another midfielder after preliminary discussions with Wigan Athletic regarding a possible loan move for a striker.
While telling trialists there is no contract for them is not a pleasant part of his role, McCarthy believes his honesty with the players at the outset makes that process less difficult.
He said: "I think you have to have a conversation when you're bringing people in that's really honest and it's that initial conversation that allows you to be fair when it comes to the end.
"That's the conversation I take a lot of time over and I invite them and explain it's not just one session and that we'll have a chance to have a look at them in games and I feel like we've been able to do that.
"If I get to the end and I make a decision where it's a no then I'm comfortable with it because I feel like I've set it up and done it properly and I couldn't do it if I felt like I was cheating somebody or made some false promises.
"They know the situation and we're close because we've got 18 of the 20 but there's a couple of players that are in consideration but the Sunday after the Marine game is probably when I'll make a lot of phone calls.
"I think people know that in terms of defence and midfield, I'm quite old fashioned in how I build a team and then we look at the strikers which we're doing now.
"Wigan mentioned a player that we might able to have who played against us last week so we had a little look there and he might fit the bill and then again we've got a game against Burnley and Burton.
"I'm happy with what I've got and it allows me to make sure the final two bits are right and I think people can see then that we've got a decent squad."
