An influencer got in the way of Swindon Town making a signing this window, according to Head of Football Jamie Russell.

Swindon have brought in six players during this transfer window as Russell, Les Caffery, and Gavin Gunning look to bolster the first-team squad that was ravaged by injuries during the first half of the season.

During the Fan’s Forum on Tuesday evening, Russell said that the club was placing an increased emphasis on the character of players off the field that they were bringing to the club to help improve their chances of success on the pitch.

As an example of this, Russell said that the club had decided not to sign a player during this window partially because of the impact an influencer partner had had on their personality.

He said: “When you are at home and you are playing Championship Manager or Football Manager, the game is really simple because they are just names on a database and you just move them and change them around.

“Unfortunately, we deal with real people and they have got families and they have got children and January is a really difficult window because you are moving dad halfway through a season.

“There are a lot of things around the person and partners and different things like that.

“We had a player recently whose partner is an influencer, so for him to come we had to buy a house for that person or an apartment and there were about 100 specifications that came with this player and nothing was about football.

“For us straight away we were like ‘Do you want to be a footballer? And do you want to continue your career here?’ Pretty quickly we were like ‘No, you don’t.’

“We were not going to bend over backwards for this Premier League player and do everything that they have probably had all of their life.

“We know what we want here, so there is no point wasting time on it because we want players who want to come here and play for the club.

“Some of those boys [who have signed] have made a huge sacrifice, they have moved from the North-West, they have moved from Sweden, they have left their partner over in Sweden, and they have come here because they want to play football, represent the club, make themselves better, and the club better.”