Bradford City use games after Harrogate to audition players

However, he did admit that he has been holding unofficial auditions for certain players on whom the decision over whether they stay or depart could still go either way.

With the Bantams in no danger of being relegated and needing a mathematical miracle to make the League Two play-offs, the T&A asked Alexander whether that has been affecting his selection process for games, prioritising those the club need to make a big decision on in the next month or two.

He responded: “After the Harrogate defeat last month basically ended our chances of reaching the play-offs, while we still wanted to get back to winning, as you can see from our results since, there was a balance we needed to strike.

“It was a case of needing to be clear in our thoughts about a couple of players who we feel could potentially help us going forward and giving them the opportunity to show that.

“There’s no-one in the team right now that doesn’t deserve to play and no-one letting us down, so it’s not a case of us carrying anyone just for the sake of seeing how they do on the pitch.

“But we’ve certainly had an eye on seeing what this team needs to be in the future.

“When we got into the game after the Harrogate one, we, as staff, knew it was important to do that, for the benefit of the club and the team.

City certainly were not trying to get thumped by Harrogate, but it did at least offer them a window of opportunity to try something new. (Image: Thomas Gadd.)

“It was also for the benefit of the supporters, because they need to know we’re serious about turning this football club into a successful one.”

Despite a season full of disappointment and apathy, City announced they had sold 9,849 season tickets by yesterday lunchtime, with Alexander letting the cat out of the bag by saying an added surge around that announcement has seen that number swell to over 11,000 at the time of him speaking to the press yesterday.

While it is hard to imagine Alexander ever wanting to do anything at a club other than better it, do those figures give he and his squad that extra five per cent boost to turn things around on the field, for what is surely one of the most loyal fanbases around?

He said: “I think that kind of announcement and those numbers would inspire players to stay, or to join the club.

“I was talking to a staff member earlier today about the passion and expectation of the supporters after watching one of the episodes of the documentary about Man City’s treble last night and Pep Guardiola was talking about the support that follows them around the country, using that as a reference point.

Not often you see Manchester City and Bradford City compared these days, but Graham Alexander does make a valid point. (Image: PA.)

“I made a comment to that staff member about how that’s really apparent at Bradford City too.

“When we went to Accrington last month, we had something like 2,000 fans there, more than half the crowd, days like that.

“That should inspire and excite you, because when you’re a young kid aspiring to play professional football, you don’t think of doing that in front of one man and his dog.

“You dream of playing in stadiums full of people and full of passion, getting behind you.

“That’s what we have the opportunity to do here at Bradford City.

“For me, those season ticket numbers for next year should inspire players and should justify the reason why we work so hard to win, because you have to try and reward that support.”