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On the subject of Manchester City, how difficult is decision for his final squad list going to be? City wouldn't be far off making up their full squad with central midfielders alone!

I was talking to my team-mate, , about it the other night and he reckoned they had 14 central midfielders on their books, so you would think a couple of those might become available.

It could be a difficult transition for some clubs and there are likely to be a lot of unhappy players out there - it won't be a nice feeling knowing that you're not in the manager's top 25 players and might only have reserve football to look forward to for four months. Still, I'm sure the pay packets will take a wee edge off their anger.

The benefit of the ruling will come to the clubs running with smaller pools and they will potentially be able to pick up players they wouldn't normally be able to afford; look at the recent year-long loan signing of to . The problem then becomes that you have contracted players unhappy that some loan signing is playing in front of them every week when you know fine well he will be saying cheerio in a few months.

That's just a sign of the times, unfortunately, and it happens at every level, including at . We've got (you might have seen him in the Sun on Monday trying to escape the clutches of team-mate John MacBeth) with us for an initial six-month period and he is keeping contracted players out of the side right now and I'm sure those boys aren't happy.

Clubs have to do what they can to get the best quality on the pitch and our manager spoke to us about this before the season started. We all know if we're not happy to go knocking on his door.

It's the same kind of situation with, who can't train with the squad because of his full-time job; yet he has started every match since he signed for the club. Again, the manager explained the situation to the players and it's up to the fellow strikers whether they accept this or not.

These are the kind of tough decisions our manager has had to make, but it has meant that we have a quality player that we might not have managed to get at the club had this agreement not been made.

Harty broke his duck at the weekend as we clawed our way back to earn a at home to Stranraer. It was a bit of a role reversal as Stranraer banged in a couple of quick, early goals to take the lead and shock us into a much better second-half performance.

If I'm being honest, I thought we were quite poor in the first half an hour or so and the manager, , was correct in saying they should have been further ahead at the break; although I'm not sure I agree with 5-1.

Harty's goal gave the team a lift before half-time. Then, once Jordan got the equaliser, there looked like only one winner. We didn't manage to nick it, though, and overall a draw was probably a fair result.

I'm sure Stranraer will be happy getting a point away from home and we were certainly pleased to come back from two goals down to stay level on points at the top of the division.

We've not had a reserve game this week, so I've not managed any match practise after remaining on the bench at the weekend. I did some work after the match and I'll continue to work on my own on top of the club's training in the hope I don't lose too much fitness with not playing just now.

It's not as good as playing games, but I need to make sure I'm as ready as I can be if the manager needs me up at this Saturday.