THE January transfer window is already on the Valley Parade agenda.

It may be less than three weeks since the deadline passed for summer business but City have begun looking ahead to the mid-season market.

Derek Adams will announce a restructure to the club's recruitment department at the start of next month following this week's departure of Lee Turnbull.

But potential targets for the next window have been cropping up in conversation.

Chief executive Ryan Sparks said: “Recruitment never stops. The windows are not really relevant.

“You’re always looking. We have lots of conversations about lots of subjects and I’d be lying if I said the next window has not been discussed.

“But it was the same last year. It was just discussed in a different way at a different time.

“They are all opportunities to get better and better. It’s how we approach that and what we do in between now and then.

“Let’s not kid ourselves. It’s not the case of, ‘let’s get to January’.

“But when that day comes, as we proved last year, we’ll be ready. I’m not concerned about that.”

City have made 10 signings since Adams took charge in June to build a squad of 25 players. They hope to have Lee Angol and Abo Eisa available again after injury next month while skipper Niall Canavan is expected to be out for a couple more weeks.

But they continue to monitor who might be available after Christmas.

“You’ve got to be prepared as you can be,” added Sparks.

“That means you’ve got to make sure you’re scouting in the right way, watching players that other clubs perhaps aren’t as well as ones that they are. You’ve just got to make sure you’re at the front of that queue when it comes.

“We’re pretty pleased with the squad we’ve built. But we’ve been impacted from losing Lee and Abo, who are both excellent attacking players at this level.

“Thankfully we’ll have them back in the next few weeks with a bit of luck.

“From what I can see how Derek runs the squad, it’s all about having genuine competition.

“Players know they are under pressure and one bad performance could result in you losing your spot for a while.

“If you don’t have that and players just know they are going to start a game, it’s natural human reaction that you get comfortable and your performance level could drop.

“He has a very simple formula that I bought into fully with two players, at least, for every position.”