DAVID Hopkin will not abandon City’s free-agent hunt but is still no nearer to reinforcing his ranks.

The Bantams boss has been trying to bring in some more experience to give his rock-bottom side a short-term boost.

But his attempts continue to be thwarted – with targets often happy to bide their time and wait for the best offer.

An interest in former Scotland international Paul Caddis remains after he trained with City for two weeks.

But with others also thought to be eyeing the former Blackburn and Birmingham utility man, the prospect of any deal is still up in the air.

Hopkin also recently cast an eye over four other players in training but decided against taking that any further.

“It’s frustrating because you get some free agents in certain positions that we don’t really need just now,” said the Bantams boss.

“The ones you do want, some of them have been on massive money and are looking for that bit extra.

“It’s difficult but we just keep looking, hopefully we’ll get one or two in.

“But it’s nearly mid-November now and a lot of players that you may be able to get haven’t played since May.”

Danny Devine and Jim O’Brien have both returned to the reckoning this week and got more minutes under the belt in the Checkatrade Trophy loss at Barnsley.

As City prepare for Saturday’s trip to free-scoring Peterborough, Hopkin feels there is a fighting spirit developing within his squad.

“That’s the pleasing thing. We’re starting to see players put tackles in, chasing back, getting close to people.

“Everybody realises now there is competition for places. But I’m still one or two players short in certain areas every time we play.

“That’s frustrating but we need to make sure that we work hard and we’re still in the fight. Hopefully come January time we’ll add a few players to give the squad a bit more strength.”

City face the division’s leading scorers this weekend with Hopkin demanding more belief in the penalty area. Once again, they carved out a string of chances at Oakwell but failed to take them.

He said: “If Barnsley had created 17 chances, we’d have probably ended up getting beaten 4-0 or 5-0.

“It’s just that composure. When you do get in the penalty area, everybody is that desperate to score and they rush things.

“Once we score one or two, then we’ll go on and start winning games.

“We can’t keep creating the amount of chances we have been and not scoring goals. The law of averages says we must start scoring at some stage.

“We know it’s going to be tough because Peterborough score goals for fun.

“We need to make sure we are set up right and we’re organised.

“But the players seem to raise their game when we play bigger teams in the league.

“We need to make sure we go there with a proper mentality and stay in the game as long as we can.

“That’s what we have to do and hopefully one of the strikers or midfielders, or a set play, will get us a goal.

“We need to start believing when we’re in the box that we’re going to score.”