It's far too early to judge the success or otherwise of the summer recruitment, but the Peterborough United manager needs to make it work now

On the surface Posh have recruited well. They’ve made 11 signings and appear to have covered all bases. A new goalkeeper has arrived along with a full-back, three midfielders, two centre-backs, two strikers and two wingers. Whether or not they turn out to be any good is another matter. Will there be a couple of Lisbies among them, or will they be more like Lolos?

Initial impressions of Josh Feeney, Liam Kelly, Tom O’Connor and Owura Edwards have been positive, but we are dealing with small sample sizes here. Howard Forinton, a £250k signing, played like Alan Shearer in his first couple of months at Posh, but he turned out to be a dud. It was the same with Tyrone Barnett, the first million pound man at London Road, who Posh struggled to give away once his power had been replaced by apathy.

It’s now on manager Luke Williams and his staff to make the squad work. The ultimate boss needs to for his own job security. A run of two wins in 19 League One games in the Darragh MacAnthony era is a perilous statistic, and certainly not when the team, admittedly injury-stricken, has delivered dull dross for much of that time.

MacAnthony has invested time, money – £600k on a non-league 20 year-old is certainly ambitious – and unusual public messages of love for his latest manager. It’s true Williams appears to be one of the friendliest men in football which makes me even more desperate for him to succeed, but MacAnthony has sacked his mates before, well Darren Ferguson at least.

I’m not suggesting a change is imminent or that I believe it should happen, but Williams needs to earn and deserve that backing quickly, and 0-0 home draws with the likes of Stevenage won’t cut it. I’m assuming here that the manager has been all in on all the new signings. It would be strange if he hadn’t been.

MacAnthony even did his boss a favour by managing to take some of the attention away from Tuesday night’s soporific 90 minutes, during which Posh failed to register a single shot on target against a debutant goalkeeper in 98 minutes of play, by unveiling the 11th summer signing. Midfielder Harry Ashfield has no experience of League One football though and at 20 years of age it’s doubtful he will address the obvious physical deficiencies in the squad.

He is a ‘proper Posh signing’ enthused one of MacAnthony’s directors, by which we can assume he meant young and hungry rather than being oven-ready. I know which I would prefer after two chastening displays in a row.

Posh clearly have talent as 90 minutes against Watford’s rookies, an hour against Mansfield and 20 minutes against Blackpool proved, but is there enough mental strength? Posh looked scared to make mistakes last night and only registered a hefty 60% possession by passing the ball around at the back at a geriatric pace.

The squad was very young last night with David Okagbue the elder statesman in the back four at the age of 22. It’s hoped the absences of Carl Johnston and Tom O’Connor are temporary as their experience will be needed, especially on Saturday when in-form Sheffield Wednesday are in town, although this pacey Posh team might actually prefer playing against expansive opponents. The medical bulletins have so far been typically vague.

Undoubted transfer window success was achieved by getting six of the eight transfer listed players out of the club, albeit temporarily in most cases. However the jury will remain out on the overall standard of the recruitment for a while yet.