Scunthorpe United boss Alan Knill will need to free up space on the wage bill before he can bring in further attacking reinforcements.

The Iron manager is keen to send at least one of his players out on loan, and came close to doing so earlier this week.

A deal fell through at the last minute for one of the United squad.

Knill would not confirm who that was, but there was speculation earlier this month linking Garry Thompson with a switch to Bury.

"We are still looking to bring someone in but we are kind of at the top of our budget," he said.

"We're really looking to ship people out.

"We thought we'd done that this week but it fell through right at the end.

"I think we need to lose some first – one, maybe two, then we can look at trying to move again.

"It really is a case of trying to balance the books at the moment  – get some out and then have a look if we can bring any in.

"We had an offer for one of the players to go on loan.

"It worked for us and then they (the other club) decided no.

"If a club comes in and makes an enquiry about one of our players, then we make a decision.

"They did about this certain player and we made the decision, the player was okay with it, so he was going to go on loan but then all of a sudden it fell through."