LATEST: Portsmouth chief’s admission over players departing in January transfer window

The chief executive confirmed a number of additions are already firmly in the Blues’ sights, ahead of what is set to be a crucial period of business in the new year.

But there is going to be a need for players to leave on loan, to allow the players seen as those who can make a difference to John Mousinho’s squad to arrive.

With Pompey working with a 25-man squad, the window offers the next chance to trade and make changes to that group.

With Harvey Blair, Terry Devlin, Abdoulaye Kamara, Toby Steward, Reuben Swann contracted under-21 players, they do not count towards that total.

The likes of Ryley Towler, Elias Sorensen and Owen Moxon are fringe players who are occupying squad places, however. Meanwhile, there’s the futures of the trio loanees - Sammy Silvera, Mark O’Mahony and Freddie Potts - which will be reviewed in the new year.

Cullen outlined the considerations over departures which Pompey are already weighing up.

He said: ‘The dynamic we have to contend with is as much as we want to bring players in, and we will bring players in, we will need to look at opportunities for some of those players who are on the squad list to potentially get some playing time away from us on loan to make that space.

‘That’s why all those initial preparations are going on now. The problem you have is it’s very, very fluid.

‘There are 10 games until we can bring someone in.

‘We can’t bring a player in for that day (against Swansea on January 1) because they would need to be registered on December 31 to be eligible and you can’t sign someone until the window opens.

‘So effectively the first opportunity we have is January 5 when we play Sunderland, and it’s the same for other clubs as well.

‘So a lot can happen in terms of we know what we want to do at the moment, but we may get an injury in a key position which switches things.

‘Likewise we have players at the moment we’re targeting, but their situations can change over the next 10 games.

‘So you’ve really got to keep on it and be extremely fluid in our thinking, in a way that is different in terms of dynamic to the summer.

‘The ultimate aim is to come out stronger, as you try to do in every window but especially the past four windows when I’ve worked with Rich (Hughes).

‘We want to come out on February 2 stronger than we were on January 1. here’s a hell of a lot of work to do to get us in that position, but we’re up for it and we can achieve that objective.’