Tommy Warrilow says Ashford have done everything by the book after signing Adem Ramadan from Herne Bay.

Ramadan has moved to Homelands after a drawn-out transfer saga which saw the Nuts & Bolts submit two seven-day approaches.

Warrilow says he was told Bay hadn’t received the first one - submitted via the club website - by which time he had already agreed a deal with the former Tonbridge and Margate winger.

Ashford put in a second seven-dayer and finally got their man yesterday.

Warrilow was surprised to see suggestions of an illegal approach made public by Bay boss Ben Smith in a KentOnline article yesterday.

Smith said it was “a bit of a grey area as to whether we received a seven-dayer” but that he trusted Warrilow “explicitly”.

“I don’t think he would intentionally make an illegal approach,” he added.

Warrilow moved to clear up the issue after Ramadan was confirmed as an Ashford player.

“We actually put in two seven-dayers,” said Warrilow.

“The first one was after training on Tuesday, February 22 and I waited until Wednesday, March 2 to speak to Adem.

“We agreed a deal, and I said, ‘Brilliant, let your manager know’ and that was when we were told they hadn’t received the seven-dayer.

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“He’s a great signing for us but I was a little disappointed to read the comments about a suspected illegal approach.

“One, we’d all spoken to each other about it, so I don’t think it had to be made public, and, two, from our point of view, we’ve done everything by the book.

“We put the seven-dayer in and waited to speak to him.

“If we wanted to make an illegal approach, why would we wait seven days to speak to him? It doesn’t make sense. We’d speak to him the next day.

“Why would I agree a deal and tell a player to speak to his manager if we hadn’t put seven days in?

“We’ve done everything the right way. When I rung Ben up, I said to him I don’t do that, I don’t just ring players up, because it gets you in trouble.

“We’re welcoming Adem to the club, he’s a great signing at the right time of the season, and unfortunately this has taken the gloss off of it a little bit.

“As far as we’re concerned, we put in an approach through the correct channels that never got received.

“We’ve done nothing wrong and we’ve got the club’s reputation to think about. We do things properly at our club.”