Portsmouth boss delivers key transfer update with player hunt at critical moment

John Mousinho insisted Pompey are holding their nerve as their transfer hunt zeroes in on bolstering their front line.

The Blues boss has confirmed the attacking hunt is remaining the major area of focus at present, with their player hunt accelerating.

Pompey boss details current transfer state of play

Mousinho aired his thoughts that his squad is specifically light in the winger department at present, with Josh Murphy, Florian Bianchini and the injured Harvey Blair the players he considers as the specialist options available for selection there.

The News revealed loan interest in Spurs winger Yang Min-hyeok on Wednesday, with five signings already through the door so far this summer.

The Pompey head coach has also confirmed money is available to land the right options, but the recruitment department have to know when to make their moves in the transfer game of poker.

He said: ‘The one we’re still looking at in this minute is attacking areas, particularly wide.

‘We need to be really patient.

‘We start recruitment work really early, the second the window closes in January.

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‘A lot of the players who are on the list stay on the list anyway, so you could say sometimes signings are 18 months to two years in the making.

‘So the recruitment has been going on a long time.

‘Way before the window opens in terms of what we’re looking at and when the window opens we can start to speak to players officially.

‘We have to be really patient because some become apparent really early we can’t get them, some fall through, there’s surprises which pop up and everything in between.

‘So you have to stay flexible, stay patient and I guess the art of recruitment is to take the right players at the right time.

‘That’s a tricky thing to get right. You don’t want to pass on too many players which make you stronger, but certainly we’ve wanted to be deliberately patient to get the right players who are the right fit.’

In terms of existing options, Matt Ritchie remains out of the picture for Pompey with League One side Reading keen and some Championship interest in the Gosport lad.

Mousinho explained he considers Callum Lang and Adrian Segecic primarily number 10s, though both are versatile options in the same vein he would expect new attacking options to be.

Mousinho believe Pompey are ‘light’ out wide

He added: ‘We’re really happy with the recruitment we made with Flo (Bianchini). At the minute, in terms of wingers, we have Florian, Josh Murphy and Harvey Blair though he’s not fit at the minute.

‘We just feel a bit light there.

‘We’ve got two 10s in Segs (Segecic) and Langy (Lang).

‘A lot of players we bring in are versatile. Langy has played right across those front four positions and Segs spent a lot of time on the right, though he’s more of a 10.

‘Florian spent 90 per cent of his time at Swansea as a centre-forward, 50 per cent of his time at Bastia as a left winger and 50 per cent on the right.

‘He has that capability to play on both flanks, as a 10 and up front.

‘We have looked at versatility and a lot of our players at the top end of the pitch have the ability to be versatile.’

READ MORE: John Mousinho’s transfer vow as Pompey look to push spending.