Raith Rovers: Boss Ian Murray reveals he'd be "very surprised" if other clubs weren't interested in signing Jamie MacDonald and Aidan Connolly this summer

Ex-Hearts goalkeeping hero MacDonald, 37 – part of the Jambos team which won the 2012 Scottish Cup – and former Dundee United ace Connolly, Raith’s top scorer this season with 15 goals, face an uncertain future as their existing Rovers deals will expire on May 31.

Speaking to the Fife Free Press, gaffer Murray gave his thoughts on whether he thought the pair would join fellow Raith team-mates Scott Brown, Liam Dick, Adam Masson, Kieran Mitchell and Robbie Thomson in penning new contracts to stay at the club.

"I think with Aidan we’re very hopeful,” the gaffer said. “We’re still in dialogue with him at the moment, the same with Jamie.

"Jamie’s been slightly different just because of his age and his family goings on as well. He’s a busy guy with three or four kids so it’s very hard for him.

"So we’ll chat again with Jamie as well.

"I’d be very surprised if both of these lads don’t have offers from other clubs as they have done exceptionally well and they’re both experienced players. I’ve not heard of anything but nobody’s going to tell me unfortunately.

"It’s a day by day thing for us at the moment but we’ve always said we want to try and get the majority of guys signed up.

"But sometimes you can make an offer and it’s not acceptable for them and that’s fine, that’s football.

"We’d like to try and find out one way or the other by the end of this week anyway."

Brown (with 47 appearances), joined Connolly (46), Dick (45), Dylan Easton (44), Ross Millen (43), Sam Stanton (42) and MacDonald (41) in appearing in over 40 matches for Raith in league and cups during the 2022-23 campaign.

And Murray – whose squad was ravaged by a high number of injuries in the season just finished – paid tribute to the group for their sterling efforts during a difficult term.

“These seven lads were absolutely vital for us during the campaign,” he added.

"We said during the season that a lot of boys had played a lot of football.

"To have seven guys out of the team playing that many games is pretty good, pretty consistent from their side and also our side.

"We’re happy to have that. It builds for the future, we’ve probably asked a few of these guys to go above and beyond what was expected but we got the best out of them, they seem to have enjoyed it.

"It’s very important you get value for money. It’s huge these days in every business and we are no different so we’re getting big value out of these boys.”

Given the substantial injury problems Raith have endured in recent months, Murray is keen to beef up to a squad of 24 players for next season.

"The number 24 is allowing for young boys who might go out on loan. We just have to be a bit cuter than we were this season in terms of balancing the books and looking a wee bit more further forward, the ‘what ifs’ that can happen and what might happen.

"It’s one of these ones where you don’t want to fill up your squad too quickly because something comes up and if something comes up towards the end that’s better than what you’ve got then 24 could become 25, it’s not set in stone.”