Keegan to help players leave

Keegan is looking to trim his squad at Maine Road as he prepares for next season and he is willing to let some of his players leave for the Nationwide League.

The Maine Road chief is willing to offer a financial incentive to any team wanting to take one of his fringe players, such as Scotland defender Paul Ritchie, who had a spell on loan at Portsmouth earlier in the season.

"It is a lot easier to get players in than it is to get them out," Keegan told the club's official website.

"Paul has said that he needs to be playing and I would like to get him back playing, but we have to wait for those opportunities.

"He is probably going to go into the First Division and if there was a club there who wanted him but couldn't afford his wages, we would have to sit down and come to a compromise as a lot of clubs are doing.

"When he went to Portsmouth we paid some of his wages."

Meanwhile, Keegan has played down reports that he was to blame for chairman David Bernstein's shock departure last week.

It has been reported that Keegan's financial demands had pushed Bernstein to quit, but the former England boss rejects these claims.

"I said when the chairman left I would get the blame for it yet it had nothing to do with me," added Keegan.

"I told John Wardle that the best story was that Kevin Keegan wanted money. It had absolutely nothing to do with money for players.

"It is not accurate to say there will be more money available to me now that there have been changes. We will have budgets, as we always have had, and we will see in the next few weeks what money, if any, is there to spend.

"The teams we are trying to compete with are spending big money. If we are to really compete with them I don't think anyone is naive enough to think that anyone can do it without spending some money ourselves."