He is a viable target for Grimsby Town and David Artell because of his all-around game, which is great for League Two.

Doug Tharme, Toby Mullarkey, and Harvey Rodgers, three central defenders for Grimsby Town, have contracts that will expire at Blundell Park in the summer. However, Niall Maher’s release means the Mariners will need at least one replacement in that area for the upcoming campaign. Any additions made by David Artell to strengthen the back line should ideally complement his teammates with a little bit of pace and poise. Andy Smith, a former Hull City loanee, would be a good fit in this regard.

The 2023–24 season was challenging for the team from North East Lincolnshire. After two successful years in the league and cup, the Mariners would have been hoping to advance further under Artell’s predecessor, Paul Hurst, to start the season. That never happened, though, and Grimsby had to fight to stay in the EFL, something they only managed to do with a victory over Swindon Town on the penultimate weekend.

It’s widely believed that problems with recruitment and strategic alignment are the primary cause of those difficulties. The club’s management has already spoken with supporters on the matter and put strategies in place to make sure that last summer’s mistakes don’t happen again.

Grimsby wants to become more data-driven in their operations, and in order for this to be realistically successful, there needs to be unity between the recruitment department and the coaching and managerial departments. It appears that this wasn’t the case under the previous manager, who had a different approach and added players he trusted. Although this had worked well for him in the past with the Mariners, it didn’t work this time.

Paul Hurst was sacked in late October last year and replaced by Artell a month later. It’s fair to say it’s been a bumpy ride since, as the former Crewe boss looked to quickly implement a possession-based style his squad struggled to adapt to. After some heavy defeats, Artell rectified the situation by changing to a more pragmatic approach and a 3-5-2 system, which allowed the Mariners to grind out the results necessary to stay up.

The summer transfer window should see Artell and his coaching staff working closely with head of recruitment Joe Hutchinson to identify, target and acquire players to fit a certain model, guided by a mix of information gleaned from statistics and knowledge of how that could fit in to the model they’re looking to progress with. The ‘eye for a player’ element will likely still play an important role in recruitment, but it’s backed up and guided by numbers collected to gauge players’ potential effectiveness; a two-pronged, modern approach all involved hope will allow the Mariners to flourish moving forward.

In the upcoming days, weeks, and months, Artell wants to increase the speed, force, quality, and inventiveness. A dependable, seasoned goalie is essential. The number of full-backs is low, wide attacking areas need to be significantly strengthened, the engine room needs some class and creativity, and Danny Rose needs appropriate and varied attack support to lessen Grimsby’s reliance on the former Stevenage, Mansfield Town, and Northampton Town player for goals and threat.

Defensive solidity is another important area that needs to be improved. David Artell will be eager to significantly lower the Mariners’ goal conceded total through 2024–2025, even though 21 of those goals came in a mere six-game stretch at the start of the season and formational and stylistic approaches have changed since then.

Mullarkey, as indicated before, plays with a good pace, and Harvey Rodgers and Doug Tharme are more straightforward defenders. A speedy, technically sound center-back who can read the game well and feel at ease playing on the left side would be the ideal complement to them.