Ballinamallard boss Gavin Dykes says that he is disappointed to lose winger Ryan Mayse who signed for Dungannon Swifts this week, but he felt it was pointless keeping somebody at the club who didn’t want to be there.

Mayse had signed a new contract with the Mallards in January but following interest from former club Swifts he informed Ballinamallard of his wish to rejoin the Stangmore Park outfit.

“I’m disappointed to lose him, he had a good season for us and he was under contract but he expressed a desire to go and ultimately there’s no point in having a player here who doesn’t want to be here.

“It has been ongoing for a while and we needed to bring it to an conclusion and it came to a conclusion over the weekend and everything is now done and dusted and I wish him well.

“Ryan had ten goals this season and I suppose the pleasing thing for me and the staff here is that he had never played outside right until we put him there and we developed him into somebody for the team and I’m sure we can develop somebody else as well.

Dykes has added the quality and the experience of Richard Clarke to his squad for next season and he is keen to get the remainder of his business done early. The Mallards missed out on bringing Davy Kee back to the club with the midfielder opting to stay at Coleraine where he had been on loan last season while he will also be on the look out for a replacement for Mayse.

“We are active at the minute and we have a lot of plates spinning. In an ideal world we would have all our business done by next week, that’s the plan that I had and we are working very hard to make that happen. Sometimes though you have to wait to see what might develop, there is a lot of movement at the minute but we have to get the right person. We might be interested in a player but we will always have to check to see if he is the right person and if we can develop him. We’ll be looking for somebody who wants to progress their career, that’s the profile that we are looking at,” he said.