Following their defeat to Northampton Town in the League Two play-off final, Exeter City have released nine players after their contracts expired.
Exeter City Release Nine Players
Who Will Leave?
Club legend Dean Moxey is one of the nine players to be released. The now-34-year-old returned to St James Park in 2017 following spells with Crystal Palace, Derby County and Bolton Wanderers.
The defensive trio of Gary Warren, Craig Woodman and Aaron Martin have also been released. Thirty-year-old Martin was virtually ever-present in the Grecians’ starting line-up last season, and can perhaps consider himself unlucky not to be rewarded with a new contract. However, the Coronavirus pandemic has placed several budget restrictions on the League Two side.
Lee Martin, Jared Thompson, Lee Holmes and Brennan Dickenson have also been released. Dickenson joined the Club in January, but had only agreed a short-term contract.
On-loan defender Jayden Richardson has returned to Nottingham Forest following the completion of the 2019/20 season.
What Was Said
Manager Matty Taylor spoke about the announcement to the official Exeter City website.
Speaking about how the COVID-19 crisis has affected the Club’s decision, he said: “There’s still a bit of uncertainty, I think it is fair to say, simply because we don’t know when the fans are coming back through the turnstiles.
“We’ve got a committed spend at the moment and it is just basically trying to assess if there is any more funds available to re-sign players or to sign players.
“It certainly won’t look like its done in the past couple of windows. We’ve worked pretty strongly in the last few windows, certainly in the summer, recruitment times to bring in not a large number of players, but a good group of players.”
Taylor continued, and reinforced the idea that young players will play a positive role in Exeter’s future. He said: “This is the moment where young players are going to have to step in.
“We spoke a lot about our current group of 23’s. An exciting group, their not ready by any means in terms of throwing them all at once, but they’ll certainly get a bigger opportunity than they have this season.”
Main Photo
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