Exclusive:Portsmouth boss pinpoints how many more players Blues need to sign - and he's confident it will happen
The Blues have already signed six players during the summer transfer window
John Mousinho wants another six Pompey signings this summer - and he’s confident he’ll get them.
This summer they have also added Odin Bailey, Eoin Kenny, Rocco Shein, Daniel Bielica and Marko Milovanovic to their squad, with some players representing a significant increase in transfer fees.
However, Mousinho still wants more recruits in the form of a left-back, central midfielder and more winger options, including Abu Kamara.
And while he insists nothing is ‘imminent’, he remains confident more players will be coming in over the next four weeks.
‘We probably need six more - and I think we’ll get them’
Pompey’s head coach told The News: ‘We don’t have any that are imminent in terms of incomings, we have got plenty on the boil. I still think we’ve got plenty of business to do between now and the back end of the window.
‘We probably need six more - and I think we’ll get them. We need them. Where we are as a club, we’ve come off the back of two seasons in the Championship and consolidated, the push this year is to move away from that.
‘It’s not as easy as just clicking your fingers and doing it, it’s about being smart with the way we recruit, being smart with everything we do, but, ultimately, we need to improve.
‘That’s where we have set our stall out, we have laid the groundwork of that in pre-season so far with some of the players we’ve brought in.
‘It’s now about bringing in the real quality to affect the frontline on the pitch and I am really comfortable we will do that because we need to do it, we are desperate to do it.’
Milovanovic and Bielica were both unused substitutes at Darmstadt and are still awaiting their first appearances for their new club.
Shein and Brooke-Smith both started this afternoon, while Bailey and Kenny were introduced at half-time, albeit Bailey in the unfamiliar role of left-back initially.
Mousinho added: ‘We definitely need to bring in more, we’ve seen in the past couple of weeks that we have the base there with some players. The likes of Eoin and Luke did well today.
‘We are working hard behind the scenes’
‘Luke making his first appearance for us and his first start for a long, long time, is a really exciting prospect and I don’t necessarily think we should be relying on an 18-year-old and 20-year-old going into the season.
‘We are working hard behind the scenes to make sure we do improve on that. The reason why I am confident is because I obviously know what’s going on - and we are hopefully very, very close to adding and bringing players we need to bring in.’