MARK Hughes is not anticipating next month’s transfer window to be too busy for the Bantams.

Hughes expects some ins and outs during the mid-season market - but no major changes after being so active leading up to the current League Two campaign.

“We were happy with the business we did in the summer,” he said. “I felt we were ahead of the game.

“We don’t feel that we’ve got to make fundamental changes to the group.

“We’ll move when we think there are players that can improve us or ones with potential.

“We’ll always keep an eye on that and no doubt there will be opportunities to bring good players in. But for the most part, we’ll bide our time.”

City’s failure to progress in the FA Cup and exit from the Papa Johns Trophy will put an inevitable squeeze on the budget and there are expected to be some departures.

“We will probably look to let other players out, maybe on loan for some who haven’t had game time,” added Hughes.

“That’s the norm and there’s nothing exceptional about that. We’ll just make sure that we’re strong and ready for the second half of the season.”

The likes of Jake Young, who has not featured in League Two for three months, Luke Hendrie, with just one league start, Yann Songo’o and Levi Sutton have been on the fringes so far.

But Hughes will not sanction too many outgoings.

He said: “We can’t be exposed in any areas positionally.

“Even players that will be frustrated with their lack of game time, some of them won’t be allowed out because we need that cover just in case of eventualities that we lose anyone to injury.”

The City boss has not yet been approached by any players asking for the chance to go elsewhere and play regular football.

“Not at this point, we’re focused on what we’re trying to do,” he said.

“Clearly those conversations will be had, probably instigated more often by agents than players through my experience.

“We’ll have conversations with some that we feel maybe would benefit (with going out) but there aren’t going to be wholesale changes.”

This will be Hughes’ first experience of the winter window outside of the Premier League - where he admits it was always a tough market to crack.

“More often than not, it was very difficult to improve your squad in January.

“Good players weren’t made available because they were coveted by their own club because they had ambitions of their own.

“You just had to hope that a player’s circumstances might have changed and he wanted a move for any number of reasons.

“That’s when sometimes you can pick up good talent in the January window. But unless you’ve got significant funds at the top end, like in the Premier League, you don’t really make big inroads in your squad or drastic changes because the capacity to do that isn’t there.”