Largs Thistle will keep a core pool of 18 players for next season to keep costs low as they aim to carry on their impressive end of season form .

Speaking at the club AGM, manager Bryan Slavin defended the lower player count when questioned by supporters, and said it was more manageable, and it meant that there was still ‘wiggle room’ in the budget, in case they had to bring in an additional player at short notice.

Bryan announced his intention to bring in a keeper to provide competition for Ross Lundy, and a wide player, and was hoping to bring a player in on-loan from Ayr United to fill that capacity.

The 15 players signed are: Ross Lundy, Nicky Jamieson, Creag Little, Alan Gilbride, Mark Murray, Lawrence McMahon, Glenn Thomson, Graham Muir, Jamie McDonald, Gary Fleming, Willie McClure, Kevin Struthers, James Marks, Alan Frizzell, Sean Pierce.

Thistle are also hoping to sign up 21 year old left-back Ciaran Friels from Dalry, who Bryan Slavin has worked with before, and Lawrence McMahon, an 18 year old Kilbirnie midfielder.

Bryan said that the signing of McMahon was quite a coup, and that Kilbirnie were wanting to hold on to the young talent, who had been loaned out to Winton Rovers last season. He added that he had worked with Friels was a like for like replacement for Iain Fisher.

Experienced defender Willie Kinniburgh was with the club short term to boost the defence, and due to travelling from Glasgow, he has left by mutual consent.

The club officials remain the same for next season as the committee voted to maintain the status quo. The President is Martin Phillips, secretary Morag Souttar, treasurer Donna Lindsay, and vice president Don McKillop.

Martin Phillips said: “For me, the high points of last season were appointing Bryan and Arnie at a difficult time, and steadying the ship, and then managing to turn it round with an outstanding eight game unbeaten run. Most junior football websites and Twitter pages had us down as relegated, but we always believed we could escape."