Saturday sees Doncaster Rovers travel down to Leyton Orient, with a familiar face set to be in the home dugout - for the time being, at least.

Richie Wellens is a hugely popular figure among the Rovers fanbase having played more than 100 games before later having a brief spell at manager. His stellar work at Orient, who he took to the League One play-off final last term, has not gone unnoticed and speculation is mounting that third tier rivals are waiting to pounce. Blackpool and Luton Town are both managerless and each are said to be interested in poaching Wellens to fill their respective vacancies.

As it stands, Wellens is the 13th longest-serving manager in the country - quite the feat considering he's only been in charge for three-and-a-half years.

"If you're still in a job at a club after a couple of years, then you're doing ok!" Grant McCann mused, when the Free Press pointed that stat out to him ahead of the trip to Brisbane Road. For the record, McCann himself is 21st on said list.

Leyton Orient chief Richie Wellens, a former Rovers player and manager, is being linked with a clutch of vacancies at fellow League One clubs (Photo by Ben Hoskins/Getty Images)

placeholder image — Leyton Orient chief Richie Wellens, a former Rovers player and manager, is being linked with a clutch of vacancies at fellow League One clubs (Photo by Ben Hoskins/Getty Images)

"Richie's done really well at Orient. He did well at Oldham and Swindon and he's done well and it doesn't surprise me. I remember speaking to him a couple of years ago after he lost his job at Oldham and he was a bit down. I gave him a call and he was disappointed but how he's bounced back since then is great.

"His team is an attractive one to watch. They're an attack-based team and score lots of goals so we'll have to guard against that. They've got some real attacking talent."

That aforementioned Wembley defeat to Charlton last May inevitably saw Orient lose a clutch of players, with the likes of former Rovers loanee Ethan Galbraith sold on.

McCann added: "When you have players doing well and you don't quite get to where they get to, then unfortunately bigger clubs will always come knocking and it's very difficult to turn down some of the offers.

"Fortunately I'm at a club where we can do that (reject) at this moment in time and there's been quite a few phone calls about some of our players but we're happy to keep the boys together and see how far we can go."