NEWPORT County AFC manager Terry Butcher is hopeful that he can add one or two more signings to his squad before the big kick-off.

County produced their best display of an inconsistent pre-season to hold Championship club Queens Park Rangers to a 0-0 draw at Rodney Parade this afternoon.

But Butcher knows he still needs to boost what he admits is a thin squad with seven teenagers in the match day 18 against Chris Ramsey’s men.

“We put a real good shift in and the players were absolutely terrific,” said Butcher.

“We looked at the pre-season fixtures and we didn’t envisage our first clean sheet coming against Queens Park Rangers.

“In the first half in particular we broke quite fast and made some good opportunities and Robert Green had to make some good saves.

“In the second half as the game went on and the more tired we got the more possession QPR had and it didn’t look like we were going to score.

“But, having said that, we wanted to keep that clean sheet and we came out of the game with a lot of credit.

“We’re learning all the time and I think we’re improving and getting better with every game so that gives us a lot of confidence going forward.”

Butcher is close to making his 11th signing of the summer but Bulgarian striker Branimir Kostadinov will no longer be considered.

“Branimir had a groin injury but he is going back to Bulgaria and he’s out of the picture now,” explained the Exiles boss.

“But we’d like some more players and we’re working actively to do that.

“Hopefully we can bring in one or two to supplement what is a very thin squad.

“We’re trying to squeeze every drop that we can from the budget because we need more bodies.”

County now have just one more friendly – at Weston-super-Mare on Tuesday night – before they open their League Two campaign at Cambridge United on August 8 and Butcher is happy with how his new-look squad is progressing.

“I’m not too disappointed about not having a friendly on August 1 because we can really get the team tactically prepared as well as top up their fitness levels,” he said.

“I’ve been very pleased with pre-season; even though we’ve lost games we’ve learned a lot from those matches too.

“I’ve been really pleased with the players. Their attitude is great and we’re bang on course to have everyone fit for August 8, apart from Andrew Hughes.

“It’s been a fantastic pre-season with this bunch of happy wanderers that we’ve thrown together,” he addd.

“We know that off the pitch the financial situation is not great but on the pitch the players and myself have no worries about that because we just try to give everything we can for this football club.”