Liam Kinsella targeting a promotion push with Walsall
Walsall midfielder Liam Kinsella is out to achieve promotion from League Two this season, with getting into the play-offs the ‘minimum’ target.
Kinsella, who won both the players’ and supporters’ player of the year gongs last term, has been encouraged by the early progress under Matt Taylor.
And the 25-year-old feels the Saddlers – who were starting their pre-season schedule against Premier League outfit Crystal Palace at the Banks’s today – can give it a ‘real good go’ this time around.
On whether Taylor has discussed a particular aim, Kinsella said: “At the moment, no, but I think we all know what the aim of the club is.
“We want to give it a real good go this season.
“We want to aim for promotion – and minimum play-offs.
“That’s what we want to do. That’s what you want to set the goal as at the start of every season.
“You don’t want to just go into the season thinking ‘it’s alright, we’ll be a mid-table team’. We want to go for it.
“With the players we’ve signed and the players already at the club, we’ve got a really good team.
“We can’t wait for the season to start now, and I think that it’ll be a successful season.”
Taylor, meanwhile, feels Walsall’s stringent recruitment process has worked so far as the new signings have settled in ‘extremely well’.
Going into today’s clash with Palace, they have snapped up 11 players – the latest being defender Rollin Menayese on loan from Mansfield – and Taylor said: “They’ve adapted extremely well to our training methods.
“The group we’ve got is formulated from quite a lot of new players, but the players from last season have been really welcoming.
“Everybody is in a routine where they understand how we want to work.
“Everyone has integrated into the squad exceptionally well. Everybody is on the same page in terms of ambition.
“There are some good people in the building. There’s a lot of phone calls and a lot of background checks, if you like, that go into each and every signing.
“It’s a process that we understand will take time, but in the recruitment process alongside Jamie we’ve been stringent in how we’ve gone about it.
“So far, we’re all exceptionally pleased with the footballers that we’ve managed to get into this club.”
