Carlisle need quality in January - sporting director
Carlisle last suffered successive relegations in 1986-87
- Published
Carlisle United must add quality to their squad in January, says the club's new sporting director Rob Clarkson.
He arrived at Brunton Park in October and has been placed in charge of the football side of operations by Carlisle's American owners.
Now he is preparing for his first transfer window with Carlisle bottom of League Two.
"January is going to be important, there's no getting away from that," he told BBC Radio Cumbria.
"We need to add more quality to the group to really play the way that we want."
Clarkson arrived a few weeks after Mike Williamson's appointment as head coach as Carlisle restructured how things are run.
But results have been disappointing with just three league wins this season after relegation from League One.
And while the team have four games before the transfer window opens, Clarkson says they are working hard to get recruitment going early.
"We definitely want to do business early as much as we can," he said.
"We've got a few things bubbling away that we'd like to think we can get in for the start of January as we don't want to be leaving it to the last minute."
'The Carlisle way'
This is a first sporting director role for Clarkson, 37. But he comes with an impressive CV that includes time at Manchester City, Rangers and most recently the Football Association (FA).
With The FA, Clarkson worked with age-group England teams from under-17s through to under-21s, moving players up through the groups.
And one thing he is determined to instil at Carlisle is a way of playing that runs through the club - from youth teams all the way to the first team.
"We have to have a style, a way of playing," he said. "That doesn't mean 4-4-2 or 4-3-3, as the formation is not as important as the principles or the style.
"If you look at a club with a clear way of playing, let's use Brighton as an example, when a manager goes, they're replaced with a manager who fits how they want to play.
"Part of my role is to build a brand and a way of playing that is how Carlisle looks moving forward.
"It helps on every level. It helps on recruiting managers, it helps on recruiting players and it certainly helps when you're producing players through the academy."