AS a former player during Bury’s darker days, manager David Flitcroft is acutely aware of the difficult journey the club has been on since it collapsed into administration in 2001.

Those in charge of the team since then have been forced to work miracles with little or no money, until now.

Current chairman Stewart Day has helped tempt star names like Ryan Lowe and Nicky Adams from higher league clubs, fuelling the assumption that Flitcroft has been given carte blanche to splash the cash.

Yet the 41-year-old coach, who was Day’s first managerial appointment when he took the hotseat last December, says his spending power has been massively over-exaggerated.

“As a manager you have got to operate in financial fair play and we have done that,” he said.

“There are sanctions if you don’t and we have done.

“We are on a lot less budget than we had last season.

“We have gone from 37 players down to probably 20 now so it is something I take full responsibility for, being able to work with a budget that the club can afford.”

Concerns have been expressed in the national press that the arrival of big name players was evidence of an unsustainable business plan that could put the club at risk.

But Flitcroft has promised fans that they have nothing to fear and has vowed to prove the doubters wrong.

He said: “When people are doing well they will always there to be shot at – that’s the British public. That’s the mentality of British people. We don’t really see positives, we are always looking for a negative.

“All the good stories that are at the football club sometimes do not get the coverage. It is always the stories of negativity, but with Stewart Day and this board the club is in the best hands it has been in for a hell of a long time.

“There will be people that don’t want it to work, but you get that at every football club.”

Flitcroft has pointed not just to his side’s position in the League Two table, sitting in fourth place, just four points off the top, but also to his success in developing players into what could turn out to be valuable assets.

“When I came to the football club, I don’t think we had any assets on the pitch,” he said. “I would now argue that there are three players in that team that could be worth more than £500,000 – Danny Mayor, Nathan Cameron and Danny Rose.

“We are trying to bring a real professionalism to this club and drive it forward.

“I don’t know anyone who has been successful without taking risks. In the property game and in the world of finance you take a risk and you get rewarded.

“But we know what we are doing, the chairman knows what he is doing and all those doubters out there, good luck to you because some people are only happy if there is negativity.”