KIM HELLBERG is excited about Middlesbrough's plans for the January transfer window after meeting with Kieran Scott and club recruitment bosses this week.
Hellberg sat down with Scott and head of recruitment Chris Jones and the head coach was hugely impressed by the players who've been scouted and lined up as potential targets ahead of next month's window.
It's the first time the head coach has had the opportunity to sit down with club recruitment chiefs and talk about January in great depth.
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As well as assessing potential targets, Hellberg, members of his coaching team and recruitment staff discussed the current make-up of the squad as they plan to make tweaks and improvements next month.
"Kieran will kill me if I tell everything here," laughed Hellberg in his press conference on Friday.
"But it was a very good meeting. I was very impressed.
"It was more about them telling me about players they had [scouted and identified as potential targets] and how they look at the squad, and then we had a very good discussion around the squad, around the possibilities to bring in.
"It was a very good meeting and they are top at what they do. I am very lucky to have such good quality people in those roles who work very, very tough and hard and put a lot of energy and time into finding the right players for for us and of course also for me.
"So I was very impressed by the meeting and hopefully you will see along the road which players will end up here."
Boro's recruitment team have been planning for January since the summer, but there was obviously the unexpected twist of a managerial change in that time.
But the fact Hellberg was so impressed by the players identified as potential targets shows the recruitment team and the head coach are very much on the same page.
"That's very important," said Hellberg.
"That was a big thing that I talked about when I arrived here. I got such a good feeling from from my conversation with Kieran in the beginning and Neil [Bausor] that I felt, this is two people that I want to work with.
"Sometimes you just connect with people in a good way and since I arrived here Kieran's been fantastic to me: involving me in everything, talking to me, letting me make every decision of who's playing and just being a support in a brilliant way.
"I'm very impressed by how he handles everything because that's also difficult in the situation where he had to change coach in the middle of the season, and then also coming close to the January transfer window and handling all those things and being there for me every day. He's been brilliant."
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