Shropshire Star

Jack Grimmer: Shrewsbury signings a 'masterstroke'

Former Shrewsbury fans' favourite Jack Grimmer reckons the dual signing of former Coventry colleagues Jordan Shipley and Tom Bayliss could be a 'masterstroke' and 'signings of the summer'.

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Wycombe right-back Grimmer, 28, made 58 appearances for Shrews across three loan spells before leaving Fulham for Coventry – with whom he won promotion alongside the duo.

Energetic midfielder Shipley, 24, won two promotions from League Two to the Championship with his boyhood club. Fellow attack-minded midfielder Bayliss, 23, climbed to League One with the Sky Blues before he was snapped up by second tier Preston for a hefty fee reported at £1.2million.

The pair have checked in at Montgomery Waters Meadow this summer as Steve Cotterill moved to seal the free transfers. Scot Grimmer, who is heading into his fourth season at League One rivals Wycombe, is impressed from afar.

"If you get both of them a run under a manager who instils that belief and trust in them then either could work out as one of the best signings of the summer," Grimmer told the Shropshire Star.

"They will have that relationship from Coventry which inevitably does help you settle in quicker, especially playing together. The season we got promoted they played an integral part, to get both could work out as a masterstroke.

"In this game it's interesting, you see players maybe peak early, and like with these two players can reset and can go up and peak again.

"Even going into the mid-to-late twenties over the next x-number of years can really kick on again. That's why the investment is there, they see potential with a long way to go."

Shipley was Town's first signing of the summer on May 11. Grimmer said: "Shippers is a player that can get around the pitch. A modern-day midfielder, tidy on the ball, with a great strike of the ball.

"He's bagged a few goals like that, from the edge of the box, he offers that long-range shooting with goals and assists too.

"I've seen him coming through, he was a quiet lad at first, but he did most of his talking on the pitch.

"Playing for a club the size of Coventry you grow both off and on the pitch.

"Both Shippers and Bayliss grew into the roles. Shippers stayed and had more chance to grow at the club he came through at. He grew into a man, you can see from comments he's clearly loved by fans, which speaks volumes.

A teenage Bayliss burst on the scene in late 2017 and scored nine goals in 73 games before his Championship move in 2019.

Town's former full-back said of the exciting Bayliss: "When he burst through he was one of these players in tight spaces would then burst out with the ball and run half the pitch.

"That was one of his biggest things, to glide past people like they weren't there.

"To get him back to his best - for me that is his best, when he's gliding through, attacking the box.

"For us he helped massively when he'd glide out from the back third with the ball, through the middle third and up to attack.

"At such a young age he had that confidence, no fear, by the end of the season he had a bit of a swagger about him.

"I'm surprised at how little game time he's had, because when you give him a chance there is a really, really good player in there.

"I hope it's a bit of a reset for his career now. He has the League Two promotion with Cov and last season (at Wigan) as well. He knows what it takes."