With so much happening since the end of last season, we've kicked off this season's Q&A interviews by putting Jimmy Quinn 'on the spot' with a selection of your questions.

Here's part two of the interview. Click on the "Q&A" link on the left to access the first instalment.

Matt Frost asks:
When did you let the board know you thought Robbie Simpson worth another contract, and what did you think of the deal?

JQ: We were talking to Robbie Simpson as far back as last November. Bearing in mind that Robbie had two injuries - he did his ankle against Stevenage in the first game I watched and then after that he had four or five stitches in a head wound that kept him out for a few weeks - but I always liked him and we always knew he had potential, and we wanted to tie him down to a longer contract as soon as possible.

The problem is that these lads have agents and every time we went to Robbie he was saying 'No, I want to keep my options open, I want to see what's happening' and there were probably two reasons. His agent was probably saying 'I can get you fixed up here, there and everywhere else', and also from Robbie's point of view he wasn't sure what league Cambridge United was going to be in this season. He knew there was a little bit of interest and perhaps the last thing he wanted to do was drop down a league out of the Conference; he was looking to progress and play higher.

The Chairman spoke to him on numerous occasions before and over the Christmas period about signing a new contract, but again it was the same answer: "Thanks very much and I like what I'm doing here but I want to keep my options open".

Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but I kept playing him so he was in the shop window and people were watching him. Perhaps in future, to prevent that happening again and to safeguard the club, if players aren't willing to give us any indication that they're going to sign for the club maybe it will be a case of leaving them out of the team. Otherwise, if they do play and do well they end up leaving you.

It's a Catch 22 situation really, but we felt that to respect Robbie's wishes we didn't want to force the issue too much because we needed him in the team to get us results, so it was very difficult to get the balance on that one, but between myself and the Chairman and the rest of the board we did everything in our power to try to convince Robbie to stay.

If he'd have said in November 'Yes I do want to stay' then we'd have sat down and sorted the lad out with a contract, but it's very difficult to do that players these days as low down as the Unibond Premier have got agents.

Whilst agents can be useful at times, a lot of the time they don't really help you; they're always looking to move their clients on because when they move that's when they earn their money.

So it was very disappointing in two aspects; one, that Robbie's left us because I'd rather have had him stay with us because we had a good relationship and he's one of the best strikers in the Conference, and two that we didn't get the right money at the tribunal.

Matt also asks:
Are you moving to the Cambridge area this season?

JQ: People don't really know what I do and there were all sorts of rumours going about. Don't forget that I put my house up for sale as soon as I got the job but where I live in Cheshire, in Crewe, houses aren't moving at all so I haven't been able to sell my house.

But I've been staying down here and I've got a place down here - Phil Law, one of our directors, has a place I stay in - and I've got a relationship with a local hotel that I can stay there whenever I want, and I'm down here most of the week. That's a commitment that I'm putting into the club, bearing in mind that my wife lives up on Cheshire and I don't see her all week.

I'm prepared to put every second of every day into the job and whether I'm at the club or not I can assure you that I'm on the phone nearly all day long every day of the week, sometimes until as late as midnight, talking to players and different people about different aspects of the game. I'm giving it the best shot that I can to be successful for the club.

Matt's final question:
I always thought Steve Castle was the vocal one during the game - is your new assistant a shouter during matches because you seem very quiet? I know 'once they cross the white line' etc but they're Conference players and many are young, so don't you think advice during the game would benefit them?

JQ: Don't forget that I see these lads every day of the week. Different managers have different styles and I do a lot of my talking during the week. You don't see Alex Ferguson ranting and raving at his players from the touchline because you do a lot of work during the week, and then you've got to trust the players once they cross the line to pull off the game plan and the tactics and the individual performances that they give.

If players are very nervous before a game, if someone is hollering at them during the game it's going to make them even more nervous.

Last season I had to pull Steve back a couple of times - and I've done it to other assistants - for shouting the wrong things, because the psychology behind the things they were shouting was wrong for our players and could even give the opposition players a lift. You've got to be very aware of what you're shouting because instead of helping the players you can actually make the situation worse with what you say.

So I tend to do most of my work during the week and I would rather encourage individuals during a game, and then if things aren't working out we can analyse it afterwards as a team and as individuals and make sure that we put it right.

Ian Elliott from Milton asks:
What would you consider "success" to be this season ?

JQ: Success this season is firstly to finish higher than last season and, as I've said, I will be very disappointed if we don't do better than last season. I feel if we can get into a position in the middle third of the table then we've got a chance of the play-offs and certainly of having a more successful season than last year.

I don't really want to be shouting about getting into the play-offs because that's putting pressure on the players. Let's just take it one game at a time and see how many games we can win both home and away, and we'll take it from there.

But I do feel with the players that we've got in that we'll certainly be better for it, and I can assure you that the players that were here will have learned a lot from last season and when you've been through those bad periods once you try your best to make sure they don't happen again. They know they need to be fitter and stronger and have more of a will to make sure it doesn't happen again, and it was a great learning curve last season, particularly for the young players.

The best thing about it is that we came out of the end of the tunnel, and from the end of January to the end of the season we were one of the form teams. We were in danger of going down but we showed great character and determination to not only get out of that but play some good football and have some great results along the way.

Ian also asks:
What is your opinion on players being owned by third parties, such as Tevez, and can you see it becoming more or less prevalent?

JQ: No, I don't think you'll see any more of it. I think the governing bodies of football will make sure that doesn't happen and for me it's a ridiculous situation that instead of a club owning a player an agent does; it's absolutely crazy.

For the last few weeks Tevez was supposedly signing for Manchester United and because of the situation that he's put himself in that hasn't happened yet. Sheffield United can count themselves very unlucky that they got relegated with all these irregularities. I don't know all the ins and outs, but when a player signs for a club he signs a contract with that club that is abiding and ties him down to that club and this is a precedent that I don't think will be taken any further.

The clubs are investing great deals of money into players and they need to be holding all the cards instead of the agents, and I'm quite sure the governing bodies will make sure that that will be the case in future.

Ian's final question:
Will you be showing any... ahem... motivational videos of last season's Histon debacle before this season's clashes with them?

JQ: It's something I'll think about, but it's obviously a negative and I think before we play them the players will have in their minds exactly what happened last year. You don't forget games like that. I've been in the game 25 years and when you suffer a defeat like that against a local rival it doesn't go away quickly, and when the game comes around I can assure you that there will be plenty of motivation going about and I'll be asking the players if they really want to be picking up the papers in the morning to read about getting beaten by Histon again.

Obviously we'll refer back to the game but I don't think that showing them the video of that game will do them any good. I think they've lived it over and over again in their memory ever since it happened

Rob Oyston asks:
Where do you and the club stand relating to the website www.myfootballclub.co.uk, which aims to have 50,000 fans owning shares and making decisions? CUFC are currently 3rd in line for this (behind Leeds & Nottingham Forest).
As a United fan, of course I would like success for the club, but I am not sure this "experiment" would be good for the club in the long term. I do think however believe that the significant financial injection into a club like Cambridge could enable CUFC to reach heights that are currently unachievable.

JQ: I've heard a little bit about this but to be honest I don't know much about it. I heard that they want 50,000 putting a certain amount of money in and they have eight people going on the board and they change the board every few weeks. I think from that point of view it would be very difficult because you'd be getting too many ideas and opinions, but that sort of thing is not in my ballpark anyway.

It's a wonderful idea to generate money but I just get on with managing the team and that sort of thing would be a decision made by the directors.

The Chairman did speak about it a few weeks ago and he's been interviewed about it, but I haven't heard anything since.

(Edit: Since this interview, director Paul Barry has confirmed that Cambridge United is not one of the four clubs to have approached MyFootballClub with a view to being taken over - article)

Jon Macartney asks:
Clubs, managers and players are fond of saying that a new season is a time to look for improvement and that there is no reason why the team can't be pushing for promotion. Has the club identified plans for CUFC returning to the Football League and can you tell us what they are, in terms of timescale?

JQ: It's all about finance and direction and it was only last year that we sorted out the finances. It's been a cloud over the club for some time with the different issues going on so from that point of view it's very hard to plan going into the league and progressing unless you've got your finances in order.

Don't forget we're still paying to rent the ground, which is a big chunk of the club's budget - £200,000 a year - but from my point of view we do have a plan and depending on the budgets and finances, I'd certainly be looking to get into the Football League within the next two or three years.

This Q&A interview will continue in daily instalments for the rest of this week.

Andrea Thrussell

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