Another of his former Concord Rangers players has followed Danny Cowley to Braintree Town.

Cowley made the switch from the Canvey Island side to take over as Iron manager last summer before bringing in Matt Fry, Alex Woodyard, Taylor Miles and Jeremy Walker from his former club and another ex-Concord player has now joined the Iron after a spell when he has been training with Braintree.

Midfielder Joe Gardner has been training with Cowley and his current squad after deciding to take a spell away from playing while at the Beachboys earlier this year.

He returned to action, though, as the Iron boss took charge of the club’s reserves in their Thurlow Nunn League division one game against Haverhill Borough last weekend.

Gardner scored twice in Braintree’s 5-0 win and Cowley said he was a player he had been keen to bring on board if he could engineer room within his budget.

“We included Joe Gardner in the reserves side and he scored two goals for us,” said the Iron boss.

“Joe was with us when we were at Concord Rangers so we know him very well.

"He was a youth team player there and then went out because he needed to be playing men’s football.

“He had time with Great Wakering (Rovers) and then Maldon and Tiptree and was doing really well, so we got him back at Concord.

“He was a key player for us and we wanted to bring him in at Braintree so he has been training with us for a while and Saturday was a good chance for him to be involved.

“He wants to play at the highest level.”

Concord announced via Twitter earlier today that Gardner had had his Vanarama National League South registration with them cancelled, clearing the way for his move to the Iron.

Cowley confirmed that Gardner would travel with his squad to Southport tomorrow.

With no first-team fixture last weekend, Cowley said the reserves game was a good opportunity for players to get game time if they required it while others got some much-needed rest.

He added: “Most of the players had some down time as the last week has been the first structured break that they’ve had since June.

“The ones who had played six games in 16 days have had the chance to recharge the batteries, while those who hadn’t played as regularly got some game time that they needed in the reserves on Saturday.

“I took the game over at Long Melford and we won 5-0.

“It was much needed for some of them and everyone applied themselves well so there is some food for thought there for me.”