The manager, who was chatting to the press as the Saddlers took part in their regular pre-season Open Training Session, admitted that it has been a frustrating summer as he has struggled to recruit a central defender leaving his with just one fit centre-back as the season edges ever-closer.
Keates, who has already added Andy Cook, Chris Dunn, Josh Ginnelly, Zeli Ismail, and Joe Slinn to his squad, is still keen to add two central defenders, a midfielder, and a striker to his side and would have liked to have had his line-up settled already, but the search continues.
Speaking via the Express & Star, Dean said; "Ideally I would have liked to have got all signings done by now. We don’t live in that perfect world. There has been frustration with one or two where we have come close. There were one or two where I felt, if we could get them, they would have been a massive coup for the football club. One came down to location, somebody else came in for him and he’ll end up going there because it’s close to his family home. You can understand that.
"Another we missed out on, he’s got a possibility of going into the Championship. That is a little bit frustrating because I think they would have been great signings – marquee signings. One definitely isn’t going to happen and one we may have an outside chance going into next week. We’ll see what happens."