Chris Hogg says it will take more than one transfer window to build the squad he wants - but he accepts the only way to ‘buy time’ is by winning football matches.

Eight players have arrived at Sixfields so far this summer but the squad still needs work going into the final two and a bit weeks of the window. The deadline is September 1st at 11pm.

As usual, there’s been no shortage of rumours, particularly on social media, with Notts County player Jodi Jones most prominent among them, but Hogg says they are often wide of the mark.

"Recruitment is always important but it’s going to be even more important over the next couple of weeks,” said Hogg on the It’s All Cobblers To Me podcast. "I want to get the best players we can.

"At every level you will have clubs with budgets that trounce other clubs and I think it’s well-documented that our budget isn’t one of the top, top budgets in the league. You look at Salford and a few others who have big budgets and you might be in for players that you just can’t do for financial reasons.

"There’s also other ones where there’s rumours about players and we’ve never even spoken about those players, it’s the madness of social media.

"We’re trying to have a plan and a process and we want to align some of the recruitment stuff so we have a direction in the short, medium and long term.

"That’s an important thing for us as a football club and something I’m quite big on wherever I’ve been is trying to help that and influence that and make sure we’re not just working to one transfer window.

"We need to be working to the next window and the one after that so we have a long-term plan and we’re able to mould the squad and improve it.

"There’ll always be road blocks and quiet periods when stuff doesn’t happen, but there's also weeks where you get two or three in and you feel you’re making progress.”

But while he’s planning for the long-term, Hogg also knows the brutal reality of the modern world.

"I’m very aware of the world we live in and ultimately I have to win football games,” he added. "You can have the best ideas and the best philosophy but you need to win games and that’s what the job is and I’m very aware of that.

"As staff, we have tried to take the focus off results to an extent and go back to the process and what it looks like to be successful and how you stay in the present moment.

"I’ve been coaching for 20 years and every year it’s got more difficult for the management side of it, but I know the way I buy time is by getting results and I’ll work as hard as I can to do that. I just try and enjoy it and I want to give people a platform to go and perform.”