Five United players agree new contracts

Mark Surgenor, Nathan Hanley, Richard Gibson, Denver Gage and Gavin Taggart have all joined Gary McCutcheon in shaking hands on new deals which will keep them at the Showgrounds until the end of the 2011/12 season.

It is welcome news for Walker, with Linfield understood to have gone through the official channels to gain permission to speak to midfielder Hanley.

Walker also remains hopeful that he can persuade sought-after full-back Michael Smith , another Blues target, to pledge his future to Ballymena this week.

“It’s good news for us that those players want to stay and we will strengthen the squad in the summer and maybe even in January.

“We have to look at a, what we need; b, what’s available; and c, does it fit in with the finances?”

Walker has moved to bolster his soon to be disrupted central midfield by signing Institute’s Ruairi McClean – the midfielder had a previous spell with Ballymena as a teenager under Kenny Shiels’ management.

“We have one of the smallest squads in the league and we’re running out of options in the middle of the park.

“For the cup replay with Glentoran next week, we will now be without Nathan Hanley and Gary Haveron through suspension and Gavin Taggart, who is out for six or eight weeks after an operation on his broken nose.

“On top of that Ruairi McClean is cup-tied after playing for Institute on Saturday so if it goes on like this I’ll have to bring the boots myself!

“Rory Carson trained on grass for the first time last week and did a session with Gordy and the good news is that he has had no swelling around the knee but he is maybe four weeks away from playing.

“Similarly, Paul McAreavey has done well while training with us but again, he is some way off being match-fit,” added Roy.