CHIPPENHAM Town chief Mark Collier has gone back to the drawing board in his striker search after failing to capture Bath City frontman Nick McCootie.

The Bluebirds had agreed to pay a fee to their National League South neighbours to bring in 27-year-old McCootie, who netted against Chippenham for Paulton Rovers last term, but are moving on after being unsuccessful in their efforts to agree personal terms with the player.

Collier, who also currently has a seven-day approach lodged for a winger playing for a National League South side, is still keen to add more striking options to supplement first-choice goal-getters Andy Sandell and Alan Griffin but will continue to bide his time in a bid to identify the correct target after missing out on McCootie.

“We became aware that Nick McCootie might be available and the two clubs had agreed financial terms for the player but we couldn’t agree personal terms and that was the end of that,” said the Chippenham manager.

“I have to stress that we’re happy with our strikers – our main two are scoring goals – but we feel that we could do with some extra cover in that area, so we’ll continue to look but we won’t rush into anything.

“We have seven days in for a wide player who is playing in the Conference South but we won’t be able to speak to him until the end of the week and I don’t imagine that we’d be able to get him involved this weekend.

“It’s one of those ones; nothing ventured, nothing gained.”

On Tuesday night, Collier shuffled his pack and got vital minutes into full-back Conor McCormack, who has been sidelined since October with a hamstring injury, as Chippenham bowed out of the Red Insure Cup at Merthyr Town.

The hosts’ Kerry Morgan netted a brace whilst Corey Jenkins also netted in the first period as an experimental Bluebirds line-up were beaten 3-1 in the third round, substitute Matt Smith netting their consolation goal.

Collier said: “We made 10 changes from the game against Leamington. We managed to get some minutes into Conor McCormack and had a look at a few of the young Chippenham Park players, so it served its purpose.

“The only shame is that Matt Jones had to come off injured, so we’ll see how he is for the game against St Neots and also how McCormack has reacted to his first 90 minutes in a long time.

“Chrissy Allen also missed the Leamington game with a flu bug but hopefully he’ll be back.”