Paul Hurst reveals ideal Shrewsbury squad size

The Town boss is busy negotiating with targets in his first close season with the club and is expected to secure a host of deals in the coming weeks.

Hurst is well known for liking to work with width and it comes as little surprise that he wants to extend the playing surface that was previously shortened by his predecessor Micky Mellon.

Including youngsters such as Ethan Jones, Kaiman Anderson and Callum Grogan, who have now been released, Town began last season with a 24-man squad.

Hurst sanctioned the departures of Andy Mangan and Antoni Sarcevic briefly into his Shrewsbury tenure, and there were a couple of occasions before the January window that the club were unable to field a full bench.

Including scholarship players who have agreed their first professional deals, Hurst wants a squad of no more than 28 – but it could depend on versatility.

“If we include the youngsters then the most I would want to work with is 28,” said the Greenhous Meadow boss.

“Depending on who I could sign, and if we can get lads that can play different positions, I’d like a little less.

“Certainly with what I’d class as senior lads, I wouldn’t want more than 22.”

Work began yesterday on the Meadow playing surface with the pitch scheduled for a full renovation over the summer.

And Hurst, who favours a 4-4-2 formation, has given clear instructions to make Town’s pitch as large as possible.

Mellon reduced the Meadow surface – which was one of the biggest in the Football League and bigger than the Bernabéu in Madrid – to 110x72 yards last summer.

“In an ideal world the decision will be made once I put a squad together,” added Hurst. “I don’t know when we’ve got to submit that for definite, whether it’s to make it long and wide for the work initially and then we could still reduce it.

“But the instructions at this moment in time are to make it as big as possible.”