POOLE Town remain confident star Tony Lee will begin the campaign as a Dolphin – with boss Tom Killick believing there is a “strong chance” he remains at the BlackGold Stadium.

The Daily Echo revealed in June that National League duo Torquay United and Yeovil had made opening enquiries towards the 25-year-old, who is currently tied down to Poole until the end of the 2022-23 campaign.

Neither the Gulls nor the Glovers’ offers reached anywhere close to Dolphins’ set-price for Lee, but the Daily Echo understands that a third National League club have now come forward with an offer.

Southend United are the latest side to try and prise the 36-goal man away from Poole, but their opening offer has been rejected.

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This is a familiar situation for Killick, who has previously experienced a summer of speculation surrounding a star striker of his.

Hotshot Charlie Austin eventually moved to the Football League with Swindon Town in October after a pre-season full of offers, but Killick appears assured that as of writing, Lee looks set to wear black and gold come the start of the season.

However, he made it clear that if an offer suited all parties, he would not stand in the way of his prolific forward.

Killick told the Daily Echo: “I want to try and do the right thing by Tony but it comes to this stage of the season, it becomes even more difficult to let him go because if we had lost Tony and we lost him a couple of months ago or a month ago even, then you probably think, well, there's people around that you might identify that could come in and not replace him, but would just be an option.

“But it's getting more and more difficult, so you suddenly would be really on the back foot.

“So it's going to take something quite significant, I'd imagine, not just financially, but in terms of the whole package.

“But as I said, we do want to do the right thing by him, so we'll have to wait and see.

“At the moment, I would say there's a very strong chance that it will be with us from start season.

“I think that he's got quite a strong attachment to us in terms of he's really enjoying his football and things really taken off for him and he's got a very good relationship with the players socially.

“So I think if he was honest, you need to speak to him, but I think so far, the interest that we've had from clubs, it hasn't really ticked all the boxes from his point of view.

“At the moment, he's happy to be here, but by the same token, he's an ambitious lad and I think he's hoping that something will happen that will enable him to get a really good move.

“In a lot of ways, that's what I hope for him.

“But so far, I think what's been on the table, he'd probably say ‘it's not really sweeping anyone away’, either from the club's perspective or potentially from Tony's perspective.

“So until something comes that's really overwhelmingly attractive to him, then I would think there's a strong chance that here remain with us.”