Published: Monday, 4th May, 2009 9:00am

Pars set for summer shake-up

by Simon Harris

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PARS boss Jim McIntyre will start the task of rebuilding his squad for next season in the next few days as the club finalises its budgets for next season.

Directors at Tuesday night"s AGM confirmed they had been holding out to see if the club reached the Scottish Cup final before telling McIntyre how much money he had to spend for a fresh tilt at the first division title.

But following Sunday"s disappointing semi-final defeat to Falkirk, McIntyre will be given his budget to rebuild.

Scott Thomson, Kevin Harper, Callum Reidford, Greg Ross and Iain Williamson are all out of contract at the end of the season while loan players Rory Loy and Jamie Mole will return to Rangers and Hearts respectively at the end of the season.

Stephen Glass and Greg Shields have earned an extension to their contracts because of the number of games they"ve played this season.

McIntyre will decide shortly whether to offer new contracts to the five looking for new deals, while former Airdrie winger Joe Cardle has signed a pre-contract deal to join in the summer.

A similar arrangement for Airdrie midfielder Steven McDougall has not been confirmed with the SPL currently conducting a probe following complaints about the Pars" conduct by Airdrie.

Director of football Jim Leishman told Tuesday"s AGM, 'The manager is wanting to see his budgets for next season.

"There"s been a load of meetings with the directors and we"ve delayed to see if we would get to the cup final, to see if there was any extra help to give to the manager.

'The directors have tried to help as much as they can financially and have probably overspent this year.

'The manager and his staff have been going to a lot of games, identifying players.

"He has got players on an A and B list in mind, depending on his budget.

"He"s got in mind players he wants to bring in and he"s got some players he will tell he no longer wants when he feels the time is right.

"Once he gets his budget from the board he will be able to put his team together.'

Leishman added that the players McIntyre had identified up to now were a different age group to the nucleus of the team this season.

McIntyre missed the AGM to watch the Pars reserves win 4-1 at Cowdenbeath, while key shareholders chairman John Yorkston and Gavin Masterton were also missing.

Shareholder Eric Spreng asked, 'What is the view from the board on the fare served up this season?

"Is it deemed to be acceptable or unacceptable what has gone on on the park this year?'

Leishman replied, 'I think you know the answer to that.

"To any Dunfermline supporter, never mind the board, to have had one home win since October in the league is not acceptable and the manager, to be fair, knows that and he knows he is under pressure. He is not a silly laddie, he"s not wanting to get results like that in his first job.

'This is not a sympathy thing, he is not wanting my sympathy.

"No-one sitting at this table wants the results to be like that. He has tried different systems and tried different things and it"s not worked out this year.

'He knows that and he"s said himself it"s not acceptable in interviews with the media after games.'

Questioned about Sunday"s performance at Hampden Leishman admitted, 'The second half was poor. It was an opportunity missed. I chat to him most days, not every day, but I had a meeting with him today because of the AGM.

'He is disappointed, of course he is, he wanted to get to a Scottish Cup final.'