Terry Brown says he needs two defenders to complete his squad, but the Dons boss is happy to wait a few weeks for the right signing as out-of-contract players get twitchy.

Brown, whose team reports back for pre-season training on Sunday, said: “There are only two positions we need to fill.

“There are ongoing talks with a couple of centre-backs and a couple of full-backs.

“I hope to have more on them in the next few days. In a perfect world I would like to get them in before training starts but I’m not over fussed if we don’t.

“There are still a lot of players out there and they might become more affordable as the weeks go by.

“Players always have the upper hand during the first part of the summer then, as teams go back, players get twitchy.”

The Dons are still chasing former Brentford defender Sam Wood, but Brown admits he would be fortunate to get his signature.

“[Sam] is having talks with ourselves and Wycombe, I’m not too sure, but I will be surprised if we get him to be honest. Distance wise we are nearer, but finances come into it as well,” he said.

One defender he will count on is a rejuvenated Mat Mitchel-King – who is hoping to put a season marred by injury and illness behind him.

“To be fair, he played every game once he recovered from glandular fever and that is remarkable in itself because it leads to all sorts of other things and leads to illnesses and really hits your immune system,” added Brown.

“He had a remarkable spell when he came back so we are hoping he will get a proper pre-season under his belt and really benefit from it.”

Pre-season training starts with a charity cricket match before players are reacquainted with a football the next day.

“The main thing [about pre season] is hopefully we don’t injure anyone,” Brown said.

“I have been in positions before where you go into drastic training and you get drastic injuries. So we do everything gradually.

"Lots of people get paranoid, lots of people say our first game is July 14 but realistically the first game is August 18 [when the league starts].

“Stuart Cash [assistant manager] and I have always adopted a similar strategy during pre-season and that is our teams usually start off bright, full of life and free from injury.”