ALLAN MILNE has started his preparations for next season as he confirms he has nine players signed up for next season.

The Alloa Athletic Women gaffer will be looking ahead to his first full season in charge of the Wasps and has already snapped up a core backbone of the squad already.

The boss confirmed to Advertiser Sport that he has nine players signed up for next season and will be holding conversations this week to get more committed to Alloa.

Among the nine signings so far are Amy Cully, Rihanna McMinimee, Meghan Hood, Aimee Duffy, Devyn Thompson, Nicole McPhee, Chloe Pearson, Aimee Reekie and Lesley Munro.

Milne said: “We’re finalising chats with some of them next week but already we’ve got nine signed up which is good.

“They’re all happy to sign up and are all excited with the project we’re doing, there’s still a few more conversations to have but I think the majority of them will re-sign for the start of the season.

“We’d also like to bring in more and add a bit more quality and experience to help us with certain moments and games where experience might be needed.”

Alloa Athletic Women’s season end came to an end on Sunday afternoon, with a 4-1 defeat to Drumchapel.

This means the Wasps finish the season in fifth place on 21 points, while Dunipace win the league for a second time.

While the result will be a disappointing one to take, Milne insists this doesn’t reflect his side’s performance and that the positive signs are there to take into next season.

“The score line doesn’t reflect the game,” Milne continued. “For around 80 minutes of the game, we were in contention of taking the points.

“We were 1-0 down and then brought it back to 1-1 and then the final 10 minutes, decision making and individual errors allowed them to get the last couple of goals and we were trying to push to get an equaliser.

“In terms of performance levels and attitude, they were fantastic and they had a real grittiness to them.

“Our decision making in the final third cost us, if we had been more clinical in front of goal, we could have scored more goals and finish with three points.

“I’m immensely proud of them over the last few months to get where we are and it’s only going to get better for them.”