​IT IS not just the out of contract stars of Scunthorpe United playing for their futures, according to David Mirfin.

With no full-time manager, a threadbare coaching staff and the threat of relegation more than a fleeting issue, the Iron’s squad face an uncertain end to the season.

And for Mirfin – whose deal, along with Joe Murphy and Josh Wright, expires in the summer – the pressure is on for every United player.

“I am playing for my future, definitely,” the Yorkshireman told the Telegraph.

“Even if it means I move on elsewhere, I have got to try to impress someone who comes in.

“It will be a new challenge under someone else and you can’t afford to write off any chances you have got of staying at this club – I think that would be very naive.

“Even those players on loan, they are playing for a future of sorts.

“And with the lads that will be here next year, if someone new comes in, he is not the guy who brought these players in.

“He will have different ideas and players he wants to bring in.”

Mirfin feels, with hindsight, the board may have got the choice of manager wrong when Ian Baraclough was installed as Nigel Adkins’ successor in January.

“Every time a manager is sacked you can say the board need to get the next one right,” he added.

“With hindsight, you can maybe say they didn’t get it right with Bara, but the lads felt it was right, the chairman felt it was right and Bara felt it was right to take the job.

“With the results we have had it looks like it might have been a bad appointment.”

Mirfin is set to see his contract wind down before deciding on his future.

The centre-back is far from certain where he will be playing his football next season, but is not rushing to the negotiating table before the end of the campaign.

“I think undecided is the right word,” said Mirfin of his next deal.

“I don’t think I am set on leaving the club at all.

“We started talking about a new deal in October and then I got injured so both sides said we would leave it until I got fit.

“When I returned to fitness, I decided myself, with my agent and my family, that maybe it was best to leave it until the end of the season.

“I have had a brilliant two and a half years here – it is probably the best part of my career.

“I have come on leaps and bounds and that is all down to Scunthorpe. That fact is not lost on me.”