Baxter says the next few months will be key for those members of his squad who are out of contract.

Exeter have historically not brought in many first-choice players each summer, although the last few seasons has seen a greater squad turnover as long-serving players have left as the salary cap has been reduced.

"I'm not going to run away from the fact, we're the bottom team in the Premiership and recruitment and retention is a little different," added Baxter.

"The main reason being is you've got to have a look around the squad and you've got to decide who's standing up and who's moving forward who are off contract.

"You want to keep your off-contract guys who look like they're improving players and who are using this period, where we're going through a bit of pain, to get better.

"There's still a positive in keeping those guys moving forward, but at the same time you've also got to go, 'are we a strong enough squad, are there things we need to change and improve?'.

"Outside of the squad we've got now, we do also have eight players in the coming season's Under-20 EPS (Elite Player) squad.

"There's no value in you bringing in somebody just because they're available when next season we might want to pick one of those guys. I'm only really going to recruit guys who I think will improve us from where we are now.

"I'm determined not to get panicked into signing the wrong players, I'm going to spend a lot of time on it and we're only going to approach the correct players to make us better."