STAN TERNENT confirmed centre-back Rob Page is set to sign for Chesterfield but insisted: “He’s certainly replaceable.”

The 33-year-old former Wales international has been a big influence since signing from Coventry in January, helping Town keep clean sheets in 10 of his 20 appearances.

And his decision to drop down to League II after saying he wanted to stay at Town is sure to raise eyebrows among supporters.

However manager Ternent, who watched Town win 1-0 at Luton on Saturday without the services of Page, insisted: “I never got the chance to make him an offer.

“I called Rob into the office on Thursday and asked him to come back to me in terms of what type of deal he wanted here in terms of length and remuneration.

“On Friday I got a phone call from Gerry Murphy saying he understood Rob was going to sign for Chesterfield.

“It seems obvious it’s been an ongoing negotiation, because things just don’t happen that quickly.

“I would have liked the opportunity to speak to him, but there you go. He lives on that side of Sheffield and he can now fall out of bed and into Chesterfield. Perhaps that has something to do with it.

“Apparently he’s done well here, but if he doesn’t want to play for us, that’s fine.

“No one person is bigger than the football club, and Rob is certainly replaceable so we’ll move on.”

With Page left out of the party which travelled to Luton, Tom Clarke stepped into central defence as Town, playing their final match of Gerry Murphy’s second spell as caretaker boss, made it five clean sheets in a row for the first time since 1982-83.

“There was no pressure on and it was typical end-of-season stuff tempo-wise, but you can’t do better than win,” said Ternent of a match settled by a 77th-minute header from Phil Jevons, who was making his first appearance in 10 matches after a calf injury.

The victory was seen by 537 Town fans in a crowd of 6,539 at Kenilworth Road and ensured a final League I position of 10th.

TOWN’S cut-price season-ticket sales have topped 9,000 – with 51% being snapped up by new customers.

And with more than 3,500 existing season-ticket holders yet to renew, chairman-elect Dean Hoyle is delighted with the way the numbers are stacking up.

The deal ends on May 23, and Hoyle said: “Hopefully most of the existing holders will buy again and the mesaage to all is don’t leave it too late.”