Doswell confident new Hawks strikers Wright and Iaciofano will get a Football League chance during their time at Westleigh Park

The Hawks’ top three National League South scorers in 2019/20 were Jonah Ayunga (18), Danny Kedwell (11) and Alfie Rutherford (6).

Ayunga and Rutherford are now at Bristol Rovers and Dorking respectively, while Kedwell was one of seven players released last week.

Doswell brought in his former Sutton United striker Tommy Wright last month and has this week signed Joe Iaciofano.

The latter was one of three forwards who shared the NL South Golden Boot in 2019//20 - alongside Ayunga and Darren McQueen of Dartford - after hitting 17 regular season league goals

But while Ayunga and McQueen were both playing for sides towards the top of the table, Iaciofano was playing for a St Albans side who were fourth bottom when the season was halted in March.

Doswell is eager to build a more youthful-looking Hawks squad for his second attempt at taking the club back into the National League.

The arrivals of Wright, 23, and Iaciofano, 21, are a step in the right direction therefore.

Iaciofano signed for St Albans last summer after being released by home-town club Northampton Town.

He had signed a pro deal in the summer of 2017 but only ever made five first team appearances for the Cobblers as a sub.

Three were in the EFL Trophy, while he also made 89th minute appearances off the bench in one League One match and one FA Cup tie.

Doswell remarked: ‘I’ve been speaking to Joe for four or five weeks, he was my main target to replace Jonah.

‘I just saw Joe as a perfect replacement, not in the sense of being 6 ft 4 but in the sense of replacing one goalscorer with another.

‘Joe feeds off scoring goals. He’s really impressed me this year, I’ve watched him lots and lots.

‘In some ways he’s not dissimilar to Wrighty, they are both very clever footballers, they’re both young, they both have got the opportunity with us to show exactly what they can do.

‘I firmly believe both those boys will get a Football League chance while they’re with us.

‘It fits within this new project that I wanted to push forward. The two lads up front will combine really well.

Doswell added: ‘The project we are offering Joe is to help us win this league - we need to score goals to win any league - but also put him in a shop window at a slightly bigger club, perhaps at the right end of the table this year.

‘If he scores another 20 goals he has every chance of succeeding in his ambition of being a Football League player.’

Iaciofano - full name Guiseppe James Iaciofano - is certainly no stranger to scoring goals.

While at Northampton, he netted three times in six games on a work experience loan at Southern League club Corby Town in 2016/17.

That summer, after signing his pro deal, he struck a hat-trick for a Northampton Town XI in a pre-season friendly win against Sileby.

Iaciofano was loaned out to Chesham in 2017/18, scoring 17 goals in 22 games before suffering an ankle injury. He ended the term on loan at Brackley.

The following season, 2018/19, he was loaned out again in late November to Northern Premier Leaguers AFC Mansfield. A two-month stint saw him score 13 times, including two hat-tricks.

His first was in a losing cause - Mansfield crashing 8-3 to Morpeth - before he hammered a five-minute treble at Lincoln United on New Year’s Day.

Iaciofano still couldn’t break into the Cobblers first team squad, though, and ended his last season at Sixfields on another loan at Banbury United.

Like his new colleague, Wright also brings with him the promise of goals.

He made his name in the Hampshire Premier League with Otterbourne in 2014/15, scoring 25 goals in 36 league and cup appearances.

The Otters chairman at the time was Stuart Munro, a former work colleague of Doswell’s and the man recently appointed chief executive at Hawks

That came a few weeks after Munro had resigned as Alresford chairman following the FA’s decision to null and void the 2019/20 Wessex League season.

In the same Otterbourne side as Wright were Scott Munro - Stuart’s son and currently the Hawks’ performance analyst - and Doswell’s nephew, Sam.

Stuart Munro was a youth team manager at Eastleigh when Wright first started playing.

‘I have known Tommy since he was nine years old,’ said Doswell.

‘I’ve known Stuart for a long time too, we worked together at Drew Smith for 25 years.

‘I was always trying to get him involved at Sutton but he couldn’t find the time.

‘Ever since I’ve been at Havant I’ve been keeping on at him, but he was happy at Alresford.’

It was on Munro’s advice that Doswell plucked Wright from Otterbourne when he was Sutton boss in the summer of 2015.

Wright was sent on a season-long loan to Steve Claridge’s Salisbury for the 2016/17 Southern League Division 1 South & West campaign.

There, he plundered exactly 50 league and cup goals as the Wiltshire club lost in the play-off final.

Wright’s goal haul included league hat-tricks against Totton, Bridgwater and Wantage, and two injury time goals as Salisbury came from 0-3 down to beat Shortwood 4-3 in the Southern League Cup.

On returning to Sutton, Wright was the club’s top league marksman in 2017/18 with 13 as Doswell masterminded a third place finish in the National League.

Interest in Wright from EFL clubs was high when he suffered a serious knee injury two months into the 2018/19 season.

‘Tommy was on the verge of a big move to League 1 when he did his cruciate at Leyton Orient.’ recalled Doswell.

‘That was the start of a terrible 18 months for him if I’m being honest.’

Earlier this year, Wright - who lives in Southampton - took a break from football citing ‘mental health’ issues.

He said the constant travelling from Hampshire to Sutton on his own had been a major factor in his illness.

‘We all accept people’s mental health issues these days,’ said Doswell.

‘Tommy was out of football for a year and then he was driving up on his own to Sutton for training - two and a half hours there and two and a half hours back.

‘He had too much time to think about the disappointment of knowing he was that close to playing in the Football League.

‘I experienced that journey during my 11 years at Sutton … driving all that time is do-able, but only there are other people in the car with you.’

Talking about the decision to sign for Hawks, Doswell added: ‘Tommy wanted to be somewhere where he was around people he knows - his best friend is Scott Munro, our performance analyst, Ross Worner is another of his best friends, he knows Bairdy, Josh Taylor …

‘I’ve known him since he was nine, since he was three foot tall - our families have had Sunday BBQs together.

‘My main concern is for his health, but if we can get him playing like I know he can he won’t be with us that long, he’ll be in the Football League - and higher than League 2.

‘He should have been in the Football League by now, but clubs there were too lazy prior to his injury.

‘He’s only 5 ft 6, he dresses like a rag and bone man, and he rarely talks about himself, but he’s got good footballing intelligence.

‘He can play up front, or he can play in the hole … put him up against big lumps and he can run them ragged.

‘I remember at Sutton we played Dover and they had three 6 ft 5 centre halves who had all played in the Football League. Tommy ran all three of them ragged.

‘He’s also a great finisher. Bairdy once said to me he was one of the best he’d ever seen at his age, and that was something coming from him.’