WARRINGTON Rylands will have a new face in their squad for Saturday’s trip to Gainsborough Trinity – but he may be the only addition for a while.

It is a case of “one in, one out” at Gorsey Lane, with Italian wide player Chiek Thiam arriving from Northern Premier League rivals FC United of Manchester.

He takes the place in the squad left vacant by forward Edy Maieco, whose departure was confirmed earlier in the week. He is expected to join NPL West side Stalybridge Celtic.

Thiam is known as a right-back but manager Michael Clegg says the 21-year-old will likely operate in a more attacking role within his side, with a debut possible this weekend as Blues aim to extend their unbeaten run in league football to 10 matches.

Even though skipper James Neild is set to miss the next three matches through suspension after being sent off in Friday’s 4-0 FA Trophy loss to Avro, however, Clegg is happy with what he has available but did not rule out further additions down the line.

“I know a lot of people know him as a right-back, but we’ll be trying to apply him further up the pitch,” he said of new signing Thiam.

“It’s exciting for us – we’ve got pace to burn going forward and he adds to that.

“Other than that, we’re pretty happy for now.

“We’ll lose Joe Piggott in December as he moves out to Australia and then at the same time, Scott Bakkor goes on his honeymoon for three or four weeks. We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it but right now, we’re a happy camp.

“The squad is flexible formation-wise so we can deal with most things that are thrown at us so long as it’s not too heavy.

“The problem at this level is that you get offered so many players and it can be hard to turn your nose up at times, but first and foremost it is about bringing good people in.”

Blues were able to put their Trophy disappointment behind them on Tuesday by beating Workington 1-0 at Gorsey Lane to climb to second in the NPL Premier Division, four points behind leaders Radcliffe.

However, Clegg once again insisted his side will not get carried away with the position they find themselves in as they visit a Gainsborough side who have had a rocky start to the campaign after reaching the play-offs last time out.

The Holy Blues sit 17th in the table but have a new manager at the helm in Russ Wilcox and are unbeaten at home in the league this season.

“If you stick to two points per game as a general rule, you won’t be too far away,” Clegg said.

“We’re on 23 from 10 games so we’re a little bit ahead of where we thought we’d be, but it’s still a brand new group and there’s plenty of work to do.

“We’ve shown a couple of times we can be beaten, so it’s trying to get rid of the “horror show” moments when we’ve folded in games like Avro.

“We’re not any better than anyone, we’re just getting on the right side of results that can make a difference.

“We’ll take it game by game and keep our feet on the floor as we’ve got a tough game at Gainsborough now.

“They’ve got a new manager and have won two out of three but at the same time, it’s a big open pitch and win, lose or draw, we’ll be causing them problems on Saturday.”