Bernard McNally: Fresh faces at Shrewsbury Town will keep players on their toes

And it's going to be very interesting to see what Paul Hurst decides to do because the Town manager has got some big decisions to make,

Ivan Toney, Sylvan Ebanks-Blake and George Waring all see their loan deals expire in the near future.

All the players, including those three, have done remarkably well over the past few weeks to adapt to Hurst's approach.

But I think he will want to bring in a few fresh faces so there could be quite a bit of movement.

Experience is always crucial when you are battling near the bottom of the table and I think it's likely Hurst will add a bit more nous to his squad if it is possible.

It's important you keep players on their toes and a few new faces would do that. Players need to be reminded that, if they don't keep performing at a high level, they will be quickly out of the team.

Paul will be aware of that and he'll probably want to make a few alterations just to keep things moving in the right direction.

There is no doubt they have made huge strides forward ever since he was appointed back in October.

And it will be interesting to see if he keeps Toney, Ebanks-Blake and Waring or whether he has some other strikers in mind to lead the line.

Transfers though will, of course, have to wait until after tomorrow's game with Rochdale and I think this has got the potential to be a real festive cracker.

Keith Hill is an excellent manager and he has got the Dale flying high near the top of the division despite only having a very small budget.

Rochdale have been hit with a lot of injuries this season but they have still managed to get results playing a very attractive brand of football. At times they have played without a striker with Hill lining up his players in a 4-6-0 formation.

That system saw them thrash Walsall 4-0 last month, a very impressive result.

It's more likely they will play one up tomorrow but Hill does like to pack his midfield.

That though could work in Shrewsbury's favour and I'm expecting a tight game between two sides who are both full of confidence.

Hurst likes to play a midfield four but he does like his wide players to tuck in and make things nice and narrow.

He doesn't want them hugging the touchline in the way Ryan Giggs used to for Manchester United, for example. That will be important against Rochdale because they do like to have that extra man in the middle of the park.

I think Shrewsbury can go there full of confidence despite going down to Bolton on Boxing Day.

They can say 'look what we have done, look what we have achieved over the past few weeks'.

The incident in Dublin aside, everything has been positive since Hurst came in. And that trip, which the players paid for themselves, is now well in the past and all forgotten. Footballers move on from these things very quickly.

So there is no reason why 2017 can't be a very successful year for everyone connected with the club.