Portsmouth boss out details midfielder transfer stance as January window plans continue
January transfer window plans are being put in place at Fratton Park - with an update from the Blues boss over the midfield department.
John Mousinho is ready to dial down Pompey’s focus on new midfield recruits in the January transfer window.
And the Blues boss acknowledged Iyad Mohamed’s promising emergence in making new faces in the middle of the park less ‘urgent’ in the new year.
Mousinho on midfield transfers: ‘No urgent need to do anything in there’
Plans are continuing for winter player trading, with it now two months until business commences on January 1, 2027.
Pompey were busy in the summer window recruiting 12 new faces, as they upped their spending ahead of a third season in the Championship.
Midfield was a department some at Pompey felt looked a little light going into the campaign, in terms of Championship-ready options.
Rocco Shein and Iyad Mohamed have arrived in the Championship from overseas, with the pair new to the demands and expectations of the second tier.
Meanwhile, captain Marlon Pack signed a new one-year deal but will turn 36 in March with the Buckland boy in the latter stages of his career.
With Mark Kosznovszky sidelined until the end of the year with a serious knee injury, there was a slight concern over Pompey being exposed centrally as the Championship campaign accelerated.
That’s not proved the case, however, with Pack starting 10 of the past 11 games, while Mohamed has shown clear signs of quickly adapting to the new terrain he faces.
Those factors mean Mousinho doesn’t currently feel a pressing need for significant midfield surgery.
He said: ‘There’s no urgent need to do anything in there at the moment.
‘We’ve got quite a few players in there.
‘If you look at the more traditional players for the six there’s Marlon and maybe three fit eights at the minute with Rocco (Shein), Ebou (Adams) and Odin (Bailey).
‘There’s Kos (Kosznovszky) to come back into that in late December or early January.
‘Swifty (Swift) will be there when he’s back as well, so we’ve got some good options in there.
‘You’re never quite sure how players will come and adapt to English football, but Iyad’s shown he’s really suited to it.
‘You never know about that, but he’s done really well and he’s given us a headache in there at the moment. We need players to keep performing like that.’
Mousinho told The News yesterday talks with potential January targets are expected to accelerate over the next few weeks, though Pompey will not necessarily expect the level of business in previous January windows.
He said: ‘We’re identifying positions we think we need to fill - and we started doing that the second the window closed in the summer.
‘We are not advanced in situations and programmes, things can change, but we have started to plan for January. Probably over the next 2-3 weeks - by mid-November - we’ll start having those conversations a little more earnest and maybe reaching out to clubs, players agents and seeing what things look like from that perspective.
‘We want to be in a situation where we’re not taking on 9-12 players, like we have done previously in some windows - and that’s going to be the aim in January.’