DUMBARTON manager Stevie Aitken has revealed that striking deals to keep his soon to be out-of-contract Sons will be a priority in the coming weeks.

Aitken has five players whose contracts with Sons run out in January, while Eamonn Brophy’s loan from Hamilton Accies expires on December 7.

On-loan midfielders Scott Brown and Jamie Lindsay are due to return to St Johnstone and Celtic respectively, while Sons’ loan for Ross County forward Stevie Ross is also set to end in the new year.

Defenders Steven Saunders and Darren Barr are only tied to Dumbarton until January.

The news that club captain Barr was only signed on a six month deal may surprise some Sons fans, no details of the length of his deal were released by the club when he moved to the Rock in the summer. Having made the former Hearts and Falkirk man his captain, in place of the now departed Andy Graham, Aitken will hope he can convince Barr to stay on at the Rock.

After overseeing a squad overhaul in the summer when he took over at Dumbarton from former boss Ian Murray, Aitken insists his priority is to keep as much of the squad together as possible and will be working towards that end in the coming weeks.

He said: “We have six players out in January contracts wise, between loans and our players’ deals running out, so we have a wee bit of work to do. You don’t want to be disrupting the squad too much during the season. Jamie Lindsay, Scott Brown, Eamonn Brophy, Steven Saunders, Darren Barr and Stevie Ross are all out by January.

“We’ve got a few so we need to be careful and start talking to them fairly quickly, I would like to keep every player and that would be my intentions.

“The loan players will obviously depend on the other clubs, but I’ll speak to them and hopefully we can do that because I think they have been great additions.” Eamonn Brophy revealed in Reporter Sport two weeks ago that he is keen to extend his stay at Dumbarton. The striker scored the winner in Sons last home game against Livingston.

As his emergency loan is the first to run out, Aitken has held initial talks with Accies about keeping Brophy.

He said: “I had initial talks with Accies vice-chairman Ronnie MacDonald and manager Martin Canning to say it was something I would like to do. Eamonn has been terrific, he was injured against Livingston that’s why he didn’t start.

“We put him on and he got the goal. I’d like to keep him but he’s there player so hopefully nearer the time we can get something tied up.”