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" I didn't have any direct contact with Sir Bobby Robson, I was in a press conference with him once when I was doing some work for BBC Radio Leeds actually following Bradford when they were in the Premier League. He did a press conference and he was terrific in that, he had just a few words with us after that and you were actually a little bit nervous about speaking to such a great man. He was slowing down a little bit then, he has obviously had his troubles since then but he was just absolutely a top man, but I never had close contact with them.
" He was held in such high regard because he was a gentleman wasn't he. He was very passionate about his football, but I think that his overriding thing was that he was an absolute gentleman. He treated players, fans and people with the utmost respect and I think that is what increased his popularity stakes, nobody had a bad word to say about him I don't think.
" We have obviously been chasing players all the way along in the striking position. We thought that we were going to be close to getting one done today but I don't think that it is going to happen now. We put a deal to him which would have made him the highest paid player in the club's history. So the club have been brilliant, they have backed everything which we wanted to do, it was absolutely as far as we could go.
" I think that we have still been out-muscled financially by another club, but he would have been the biggest earner ever in Carlisle's history. I don't want to name him because I don't want to infringe, he is talking to another club at the moment and out of respect of that club, and his own club and the player, I think that it is wrong for me to comment on that. He has got to try to get a smashing deal done, he just given me the courtesy to say that he was going to go and try his luck at the other place.
" Because even though we muscled in as best we could financially, the other club has come out better than us and he wants the opportunity to talk to them, so I have to respect that. I think it is dead now because I think that the deal is such a good one for the player that he is going to have accept it, and we couldn't get there. It was going to be the highest in our history so we couldn't go much more further than we did and the other club have muscled us out of it, so it is dead. "
" We have had a real strong indication today though, it has been a good and an indifferent day. Because that one has fallen through but one that we have been chasing right from the start of the summer - we have had a really strong indication today that we are going to get permission on Monday to do it. This lad we have been chasing all summer and we are very, very hopeful now that it will be completed by Monday, so we would hope that we will have some good news for everybody by Monday tea-time.
" I am going to give you absolutely nothing on him because I am getting frustrated in all the efforts to do something with somebody. I would love to tell you who he is and what he is and where he is, and I will be doing that on Monday but I don't want to do anything that will alert anybody of who my target is. Because we have had a tough task trying to find the right player and I wanted to make sure this happens, and that it happens by Monday at the very, very latest.
" All strikers that are quality interest me, what we have got to try to do is to find a player that can go in straight away and make an immediate impact. Jason (Walker) is one that has come across the radar amongst a lot of others. There are a lot of possibilities with a lot of things but he is just one that is under our scrutiny, and that is all that I want to say on that at the moment.
" Cleveland (Taylor) is looking fine, he gets his head down, he is doing his stuff, he is showing a terrific attitude. Everybody knows the situation with that, we are working round it, we have hopefully got, if something does happen and somebody comes in a figure that makes it acceptable for us and he goes to talk, we have got a situation that we can do something to replace him.
" His (Marc Bridge-Wilkinson's) back problem is not a great deal of concern. I would like him to be taking part in everything because of what he has missed last season, but it is a minor problem. It doesn't appear at the minute that it is going to be anything major and probably the high workload of pre-season, with his other injury, has been a little bit too much for him to take all in. He has only missed a couple of days though and he has done the bulk of the work, so we are hopeful that he can join in on Monday or Tuesday in full training. "
" All that I can do is pick the strongest line-up from the players that I have got at the minute, because that is what I have got. It won't be difficult, we will go into tomorrow's game with another exercise for people to show me what they have got and what they haven't got. Then next week I will pick the best eleven that I have got at my disposal, so it is no problem.
" Tomorrow has got to be a close line-up to what we are leading towards, but what I have got to do out of respect for the players who have worked exceptionally hard in pre-season is not close any doors on anybody. There are going to be ten players in the squad tomorrow that are not going to be happy because they are not starting. What I have said to them is that there is nothing set in stone as regards the Brentford game, and everybody has got to keep asking me questions and keep putting in performances in games and training to justify giving me a selection poser for next week.
" It can't be that our pre-season finishes on Saturday and I am having nothing of that around the place. We have got the group together Thursday and Friday and we have told them exactly what our plan is. Everybody has had an absolute fair opportunity to give their case a shout in all the pre-season friendlies. I have been unbelievably fair in terms of pitch-time for everybody and what I have got to do now is look after what I think is the starting eleven and get them prepared.
" I also need to work with the others who will show a bit of disappointment to make sure that they know that if results or injuries or suspensions don't go the right way, that they are ready to step in and earn that right to be part of it. There are to be no sulkers though, there will be nobody left to be too down on it because they are shooting themselves in the foot if they adopt that attitude. "
Meanwhile Barrow joint-boss Dave Bayliss commented to Radio Cumbria on the situation with striker Jason Walker after Walker's recent unsuccessful trial at Doncaster Rovers :
" I think that he was on the radar with other clubs anyway to be honest, because he came back in pre-season, he looked sharp in the games and he created plenty of chances. When he was at Doncaster we had about six or seven calls from League One and League Two teams, a couple of Championship clubs have enquired about him as well.
" So I think that it is a case now of Jason getting his head down and it is not a worry for us. I know that his attitude will be spot on tomorrow at Morecambe and he won't be chucking his toys out of the pram. He will be going there with a good attitude and he will be going to score and improve his game, and he can go and sell himself again. If a team like a Championship club comes in for Jason, or any of our players, then we would never stand in their way. "