MARK Cooper has boosted his Darlington squad with the double capture of Kettering defensive duo John Dempster and Greg Taylor.

The Quakers boss has made no secret of his desire to boost his back four options after the departure of Danny Hone, who returned to Lincoln City after his six-month loan spell expired.

Cooper knows all about the versatile pair, who played under him during his two-year spell at Rockingham Road.

Demspter, 27, signed last night for an undisclosed fee. He captained the Poppies to promotion from the Conference North in 2008, while Taylor, 20, followed. He was  first signed by Cooper in 2009 from Northampton Town.

Kettering's highly-rated forward James Dance was also a target of Quakers, but it seems they have been beaten to his signature.

And Cooper is also working hard to make midfielder Marc Bridge-Wilkinson's loan from League One side Carlisle United permanent.

The forward-thinking midfielder bagged his fifth goal in 11 Quakers appearances with a long-range strike against Barrow on Monday.

However, his loan from Carlisle expires after Saturday's home game with table-topping AFC Wimbledon and rules stipulate that it cannot be extended.

If Darlington aim to retain Bridge-Wilkinson they must make a permanent offer for a player who is out of contract at the end of the season and is interesting several other clubs.

"We're speaking to him at the moment and we're trying to do something," said Cooper.

Quakers crept back into the top half of the table with Monday's 3-1 win and, with just over half the season to play, Cooper is keen to reinvigorate the squad.

However, the manager concedes that convincing players to move to the area has proven problematic.

He said: "We've got players that we're speaking to, but players have other clubs to speak to as well.

"The biggest problem we have is attracting players up to Darlington. We haven't got the lure of being in the Football League and the majority of players that play in the Conference are midlands or southern based.

"We're trying to attract them to the North-East but the only way you can do that really is to throw buckets of money at them. That's how Crawley, at the other end of the country, are doing it.

"It takes a lot to convince players that know this level to come up to the North-East.

"But myself and the chairman are not prepared to risk the club's financial position for the sake of a quick fix. We're going to do it properly and bring people in for the right reasons."

Darlington are 11th, ten points off the play-offs, and Cooper added: "We're halfway through the season and we're halfway down the table which suggests we're not good enough so we've got to do whatever we can do to make it better.

"We're not kidding ourselves, we need to bring better players into the club to make the group that we've got even better.

"If we can get two or three players in that can help them group then I'm sure we'll get steadily better as the second half of the season progresses."

There will also be exits from the Arena during January, with the likes of Kelvin Jack, who has been on loan at Kettering, Kevin Austin and Joe Clark all available.

Cooper added: "Sometimes you need to get people out in order to get people in. 

"You have to work your budget and manufacture your funds by moving your squad about.

"Of course, you have your three or four that are the mainstay of your team that you don't want to lose.

"But there will be three or four leaving if clubs will take them."