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Graham Coughlan has informed the Bristol Rovers players he's leaving the club and is ready to take a job at League Two Mansfield Town, Bristol Live understands.

Just a few minutes after a brilliant 2-1 victory over Ipswich Town which lifted the Gas into fourth in League One, Coughlan astonishingly revealed he is considering his future at Rovers and will make a decision on Sunday morning.

Coughlan has informed the squad he has been offered a job at a club closer to his home in Sheffield and will take assistant manager Joe Dunne with him, just 12 months after replacing Darrell Clarke at the Memorial Stadium.

Bristol Live has learned that club is Mansfield who are placed 18th in League Two but crucially are just 45 minutes from Sheffield with The Stags having dismissed John Dempster on Saturday night within a few hours of Coughlan's startling admission.

The Dubliner implied during his remarkable post-match press conference at Portman Road that a lack of financial resources and a feeling he has taken the club as far as he can go have made him question is future.

And while that is true to a point, the fact he has been effectively commuting from Bristol to Sheffield, where his family are based, has begun to take its toll on his overall happiness.

Coughlan shares a flat with Dunne in Bristol city centre and while he tries to maintain a settled home life by travelling back to Yorkshire at least once a fortnight, the pressures of the job and the relentless fixture schedule make it incredibly difficult.

Coughlan met with club president Wael Al-Qadi in Bristol earlier this month, a day after the penalty shootout win over Leyton Orient in the EFL Trophy, where the January transfer window was a main topic of conversation.

There is a will within the club of making additions in the New Year and maintaining this unlikely promotion push but the reality is that without players either being sold or higher-earners moved on, the finances simply aren't there due to concerns over the EFL's Profit & Sustainability rules.

That is why Jonson Clarke-Harris contract negotiations have stalled and although the striker's uncertain future has been pin-pointed as to one possible reason for Couglan's impending departure, that is not thought to be the case.

There is interest across the Championship and League One in the 25-year-old but, as it stands, no concrete bids or discussions have been held with the Rovers hierarchy and there is no indication he will definitely be sold in January.

Although pre-season predictions for Rovers ranged from top 10 to even relegation, among some League One commentators, Coughlan's aim was to push up the table and privately he loathed the idea of being content in mid-table.

A major source of frustration for the 45-year-old has been the condition of the club's training ground at Cribbs which he believes is responsible for a number of injuries to key players, in particular the stop-start campaign of Clarke-Harris.

There has been a growing concern that with such a small squad, few resources to improve it as it stands and the daily fear of another individual sustaining an injury, sustaining a promotion push is simply unrealistic.

For Al-Qadi, Coughlan's expected departure and some of the reasons behind it will turn further focus to Dwane Sports' ownership as this manner of this exit has echoes of Darrell Clarke a year ago, albeit with the club in a considerably improved position in the league.

Clarke's tenure came crashing down amid poor results and the manager's own anger at a lack of progress off the field with the stadium and training ground plus his perception he wasn't properly backed in the transfer window.

However, many of the problems that Coughlan has encountered in terms of his squad building have stemmed from over-spending on wages during the Clarke era.

There has been an acknowledgement from within the club that needed to be addressed and has led to excellent work behind the scenes from director of football Tommy Widdrington in building and executing a realistic recruitment strategy.

Al-Qadi has also been encouraged to invest in the academy and it is perhaps symbolic that the squad for the Ipswich win contained seven prospects under the age of 22 in Alfie Kilgour, Rollin Menayese, Michael Kelly, Cam Hargreaves, Lucas Tomlinson, Luca Hoole and Kieran Phillips.

They now represent the future of the club but Al-Qadi has a job on his hands in addressing the present but Graham Coughlan, unfortunately, appears now in the past of Bristol Rovers Football Club.

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