IAN BARACLOUGH is out for quality, not quantity, as he sculpts a Motherwell team for the forthcoming campaign.

The Fir Park manager finished last season with a squad of 30 thanks to a host of new recruits and loan signings flooding in during January and February.

However, that tally was cut down by 18 as a raft of first-team stars departed during the summer.

Baraclough has already set about adding to the number left in Lanarkshire, and has convinced Lionel Ainsworth to stay as well as recruiting full-back Joe Chalmers and ex-Well striker David Clarkson.

The Motherwell manager is hopeful of bringing in more fresh faces over the coming days and weeks, but he is focused on getting the right players in rather than simply filling out his squad.

“We’re hopeful of bringing a steady trickle into the club,” said Baraclough. “We’ve had three-and-a-half weeks and some people have stolen a march on players you’d targeted, but that was the scenario because we didn’t know what league we were going to be in.

“They couldn’t commit and we couldn’t commit. That put a bit of a spanner in the works. But we’re looking to bring some quality players in.

“I’m going to work with a smaller squad than we ended with last season. There were probably too many, even though we needed them. I’ll probably work with 20 to 21, which is a compact number.

“Everyone’s involved. And we’ve a number of young lads coming through the system and we’ve several of those who I think can progress this season. We have 14 just now, so we need five or six.”

Motherwell went through one of their worst seasons for years last time out as they were scrapping to avoid relegation.

However, Baraclough believes beating Rangers 6-1 in the Premiership play-off will help paint Motherwell as an attractive prospect to any potential targets.

“I think so and I think things can only improve as well,” he said.

“In the last two months of the season we got better and better, culminating in that two-legged game with Rangers when we played with flair, confidence and we showed a clinical and ruthless side.

“Everything we were working towards came together. Of course there were edgy parts of the games, but we got over the line quite convincingly.

“Hopefully that shows people what they are getting into and that we can get better as well.”

For all the European outings and second-placed finishes of recent years, success in cup competitions has been the one thing that has continued to trouble Motherwell.

Since winning the Scottish Cup back in 1991, the Steelmen have only reached two finals since, losing them both in 2005 and 2011.

Recent attempts have ended in defeat early on for Well, but Baraclough is keen to change that.

He said: “The goal is certainly to improve on last season’s showing. We know it wasn’t good enough for Motherwell Football Club, and we need to to make sure we are at the right end of the table.

“For me, I enjoy a cup run and I enjoy winning cups. You look at other clubs who have won them in recent years – why can’t that be Motherwell?

“People may say that a cup run can be a bit of a distraction. Not at all, they can go hand in hand. If you’re doing well in the cups it can give you a boost in the league.

“All the fans connected to this club enjoy a cup run, and I don’t think they are any different to any other club in the land.

“We haven’t had that in recent seasons and we’d like to have one.”