The Doncaster Rovers chairman jetted off to his holiday home in Majorca this week and joked: "It's better off if I'm away and then nobody can contact me with any offers for our players."

Reports have proliferated in recent weeks suggesting bids have been made for defensive kingpin Matt Mills and midfield stars Brian Stock and Richie Wellens.

The latest claimed that Championship rivals Nottingham Forest had made a 'final offer' of £2.5million for former Manchester City man Mills.

But Ryan rubbished the reports and dismissed the rumours as "pure speculation".

He said: "The one about Matt Mills is complete nonsense because there has been no contact at all with Nottingham Forest.

"If a bid had been made for any of our players I would expect to be informed.

"But the manager knows nothing about it and neither do I.

"Besides, if any of our players were to leave, I would expect them to go to Premier League clubs - and not teams in the same division."

The Rovers chief said that although interest had been expressed by other clubs in one or two players at the end of last season there had been no inquiries for anyone in recent weeks.

He added: "Despite what you may have read or heard elsewhere that's the truth of the matter.

"It's the football silly season at this time of year and hardly a week goes by without players being linked to other clubs without any evidence to back it up.

"It's also true to say that we have made no inquiries ourselves about trying to sign anybody apart from Neil Kilkenny at Leeds."

Ryan said the current thinking was to try and keep the squad together and attempt to build on the remarkable run of results over the second half of last season which would have been enough to see the club promoted to the Premier League if repeated over the entire campaign.

He added: "We had an unbelievable run of bad luck at the start of last season but if that reversed itself, and we got off to a flier this time, we could have a very interesting season.

"If possible I would like to keep everyone together for one more season and have a crack at it.

"If nobody left then we wouldn't be looking to bring too many players in.

"Maybe a couple of Premier League players on loan and we would have another look at it in January depending on where we are in the table and what sort of crowds we are getting."

With Rovers believing the players they have in midfield are as good as any in the Championship the likely Premier League loan targets would be a striker and a versatile defender.

* Rovers' first round Carling Cup clash away to Notts County has been confirmed for Tuesday, August 11, (7.45pm).

Nottingham Forest had also been drawn at home to Bradford City but that match will now take place the following evening.