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| Sean Dyche adds to his backroom team |
We recently learned that chief scout Des Taylor and colleague Bryan Glover, brought in from Bournemouth and West Ham, had left the club with local man Lee Maybury promoted to senior scout working alongside the club's head of recruitment and analytics Lee Darnborough.
Yesterday the news broke of the departure of Jonathan Dazlell, the fitness coach brought in by former manager Eddie Howe in January 2011. That has now been confirmed by the club as has the appointment of Mark Howard who was formerly the head of sports science having also worked for Bolton, Newcastle, Coventry and Fulham.
It was clear there would be changes in this area with manager Sean Dyche on numerous occasions referring to the fitness of players, and he said today: "We are delighted to welcome Mark to the club. We looked at a number of people from different areas and different sports to fill the role and felt Mark was the outstanding candidate.
"He has a good history with ten years experience and is well thought of in the game. We had good reference points from various sources and we think he is appropriate for the club."
Dyche continued: "Mark will take responsibility for the strength and conditioning of the group and the nutritional side. His role is to support the players and align them with what we feel is appropriate for the fitness, sharpness and well being of the players."
Howard said: "I heard that Sean was looking for someone to come in and develop something good here over a period of time. I managed to make contact and following a meeting here at the training ground, I was fortunate to land the job.
"I am delighted to be here and looking forward to the role. First and foremost we have a good squad here, who look like they are hungry to learn and be educated. That's where I come in and hopefully I can reinforce what has already been put in place here with some good sports science practice and make the players available as often as possible and as fit as possible."