diff --git a/lambeq/core/utils.py b/lambeq/core/utils.py
index 7163b6c4..0e32d405 100644
--- a/lambeq/core/utils.py
+++ b/lambeq/core/utils.py
@@ -14,9 +14,16 @@
 
 from __future__ import annotations
 
+import logging
 from math import floor
 import pickle
-from typing import Any, List, Union
+from typing import Any, List, TYPE_CHECKING, Union
+
+import spacy
+
+
+if TYPE_CHECKING:
+    import spacy.cli
 
 
 TokenisedSentenceType = List[str]
@@ -94,3 +101,16 @@ def normalise_duration(duration_secs: float | None) -> str:
 def fast_deepcopy(obj: Any) -> Any:
     """Fast deepcopy (faster than `copy.deepcopy`)."""
     return pickle.loads(pickle.dumps(obj))
+
+
+def get_spacy_tokeniser(
+    model: str = 'en_core_web_sm'
+) -> spacy.language.Language:
+    try:
+        return spacy.load(model)
+    except OSError:
+        logger = logging.getLogger(__name__)
+        logger.warning('Downloading SpaCy tokeniser. '
+                       'This action only has to happen once.')
+        spacy.cli.download(model)
+        return spacy.load(model)
diff --git a/lambeq/experimental/discocirc/coref_resolver.py b/lambeq/experimental/discocirc/coref_resolver.py
index 398e84aa..7d4b50c5 100644
--- a/lambeq/experimental/discocirc/coref_resolver.py
+++ b/lambeq/experimental/discocirc/coref_resolver.py
@@ -14,10 +14,17 @@
 
 from abc import ABC, abstractmethod
 import re
+from typing import TYPE_CHECKING
 
 import spacy
 import torch
 
+from lambeq.core.utils import get_spacy_tokeniser
+
+
+if TYPE_CHECKING:
+    import spacy.cli
+
 
 SPACY_NOUN_POS = {'NOUN', 'PROPN', 'PRON'}
 TokenisedTextT = list[list[str]]
@@ -103,7 +110,7 @@ def __init__(
         from maverick import Maverick
 
         # Create basic tokenisation pipeline, for POS
-        self.nlp = spacy.load('en_core_web_sm')
+        self.nlp = get_spacy_tokeniser()
         self.model = Maverick(hf_name_or_path=hf_name_or_path,
                               device=device)
 
@@ -165,7 +172,7 @@ class SpacyCoreferenceResolver(CoreferenceResolver):
 
     def __init__(self):
         # Create basic tokenisation pipeline, for POS
-        self.nlp = spacy.load('en_core_web_sm')
+        self.nlp = get_spacy_tokeniser()
 
         # Add coreference resolver pipe stage
         try:
@@ -174,9 +181,9 @@ def __init__(self):
         except OSError as ose:
             raise UserWarning(
                 '`SpacyCoreferenceResolver` requires the experimental'
-                ' `en_coreferenc_web_trf` model.'
+                ' `en_coreference_web_trf` model.'
                 ' See https://github.com/explosion/spacy-experimental/releases/tag/v0.6.1'  # noqa: W505, E501
-                ' for installation instructions. For a stable installation, '
+                ' for installation instructions. For a stable installation,'
                 ' please use Python 3.10.'
             ) from ose
 
diff --git a/lambeq/tokeniser/spacy_tokeniser.py b/lambeq/tokeniser/spacy_tokeniser.py
index 68999e35..867e6f7f 100644
--- a/lambeq/tokeniser/spacy_tokeniser.py
+++ b/lambeq/tokeniser/spacy_tokeniser.py
@@ -24,20 +24,16 @@
 __all__ = ['SpacyTokeniser']
 
 from collections.abc import Iterable
-import logging
 from typing import TYPE_CHECKING
 
-from lambeq.tokeniser import Tokeniser
+import spacy
+import spacy.lang.en
 
-if TYPE_CHECKING:
-    import spacy
-    import spacy.cli
+from lambeq.core.utils import get_spacy_tokeniser
+from lambeq.tokeniser import Tokeniser
 
 
-def _import_spacy() -> None:
-    global spacy
-    import spacy
-    import spacy.lang.en
+if TYPE_CHECKING:
     import spacy.cli
 
 
@@ -45,15 +41,7 @@ class SpacyTokeniser(Tokeniser):
     """Tokeniser class based on SpaCy."""
 
     def __init__(self) -> None:
-        _import_spacy()
-        try:
-            self.tokeniser = spacy.load('en_core_web_sm')
-        except OSError:
-            logger = logging.getLogger(__name__)
-            logger.warning('Downloading SpaCy tokeniser. '
-                           'This action only has to happen once.')
-            spacy.cli.download('en_core_web_sm')
-            self.tokeniser = spacy.load('en_core_web_sm')
+        self.tokeniser = get_spacy_tokeniser()
         self.spacy_nlp = spacy.lang.en.English()
         self.spacy_nlp.add_pipe('sentencizer')
 
diff --git a/setup.cfg b/setup.cfg
index 2fca7dd0..edf6f957 100644
--- a/setup.cfg
+++ b/setup.cfg
@@ -91,8 +91,7 @@ test =
     pytest
 
 experimental =
-    en-core-web-sm @ https://github.com/explosion/spacy-models/releases/download/en_core_web_sm-3.8.0/en_core_web_sm-3.8.0-py3-none-any.whl
-    maverick-coref == 1.0.3
+    maverick-coref >= 1.0.3
 
 [options.entry_points]
 console_scripts =