IF I had a pound for every time I’ve been asked what I do for stories once the season has finished, I’d be watching from the director’s box, not the press box when things kick-off again in August.

It seems a strange concept to some people that news still happens after Wanderers have stopped playing.

I’ll freely admit it can prove tougher to find a nugget of information and that hard news sometimes has to be stretched to the nth degree.

All the old journalistic clichés will come out to play: Wanderers will be hot the heels of “X”, monitoring the situation of “Y” and preparing to swoop for “Z” by the time pre-season comes around, I’m sure.

But I personally like this time of year because professionally it makes you work harder as a reporter, sorting the facts from the gossip. Pages are rarely filled with idle quotes.

You can feel a little like a domesticated cat during the regular season and particularly in the Championship. Games come around with such frequency that you are rarely far from the next press conference or post-match interview. It’s only those pesky international breaks which interrupt the cycle.

Off-season reporting boils down to contacts, knowing which information to trust and, occasionally, applying a little journalistic licence or spin to a story to make it more applicable to the Bolton public.

The week after a season comes to an end can often be a difficult one for a reporter, too, as it is when clubs tend to announce when some players will be leaving.

You never take any joy from reporting that a young player has been released or when someone you have got to know quite well moves on.

Supporters tend to think the process is very black and white – that players know they are on their way out and make their peace with it long before it happens, but that's seldom the case.

Contracts are almost always left in the hands of representatives, with the lads often left in the dark until the last moment.

Clubs have to safeguard the information too. They need to be water-tight before announcing someone will be leaving, or else they could open up a real legal Pandora’s Box.

I remember speaking with Nigel Reo-Coker the day Wanderers were relegated from the Premier League at Stoke City. In my opinion he’d been one of the most consistent players of the season and I’d approached him about an interview to ask if he would be staying on. He said the right things, didn’t indicate either way, but I could see in his eyes he didn’t fancy it.

Sure enough, the next day he met with Owen Coyle and announced he was off.

What I remember most about that interview – conducted during the most morose after-season party I’ve ever been to – is that while I was talking to Nigel, I noticed over his shoulder that Gretar Steinsson was sneaking out. He was out of contract and for weeks we’d speculated about whether he would get a new deal, with no indication given from the club at all.

I since learned that relegation made a new deal impossible financially – but it is a great regret of mine that I didn’t cut the Reo-Coker interview short, chase Gretar out into the car park and give him the goodbye story he deserved after four fantastic years at Bolton.

The next day it was announced he was being released and all I could do was include his name among a general list of other players who had left the building.

There might well be some players I have a similar affinity for leaving the Macron this summer, and if that happens I’ll be doing my best to make sure they get a chance to say goodbye.

I personally think too many good players have departed this club in recent years without properly being given that opportunity.

In the meantime I’ll continue making calls, sending emails, scanning European newspaper websites and trawling through social media in the hope of picking up a few more scraps to fill the empty columns.

It’s dirty work – but in 15 years of working in newspapers I don’t think I’ve ever gone with an empty back page yet.