Forest Green Rovers received more than 70 applications for the position of head coach after they parted ways with Mark Cooper on Sunday.

Mr Cooper led Forest Green into League Two in the 2016/17 season, but of their last six games, the team lost five and drawn one, leading to their search for a new manager.

Club chairman Dale Vince said he wants to take the team in a more progressive and modern direction.

“We’re very excited about the people that are knocking on our door right now,” said Mr Vince.

“I think we’ll be looking for a different approach and for somebody who really fits the football philosophy that we have as a club and that will take a bit of time.

“I think we’ll take a different direction. We’ll be looking for progressive and more modern approach to the game and a coach instead of a manager. Of course, we recruited Mark as a manager and then he became coach."

Forest Green are currently sixth in Sky Bet League Two, and under-18s Manager Jimmy Ball has been drafted in as interim Head Coach of the first-team until the end of the season.

“We’re in recruitment mode now. We had 70 Cvs overnight, some very interesting ones so I think we’ll take a new direction in our recruitment, maybe we’ll break some new ground, but lets see.

“The first thing we wanted to do was to have a new coach in pace for today because we’ve got four training days before the next game on Saturday, we wanted to make the most of that.

“Meanwhile we’ll start looking to see if there’s somebody we can find that may come in on an inter-rim basis or we may find the right permanent person, but I think that will take a bit longer."