Revealed: Portsmouth boss details extent of transfer push with Chelsea starlet and Reading target still in sights

And the Blues boss has outlined how every single one of the 12 signings made in the squad overhaul, started from a list of names over 100 deep.

That remains the case as the hunt for the central attacking option nears a conclusion, with Chelsea’s Tino Anjorin still firmly an option.

In a fascinating insight, Mousinho lifted the lid on the lengths the recruitment team are continuing to go to in an effort to make Pompey a League One force next term.

He said: ‘We’re putting the due diligence into all of them (potential signings). It’s so that when we come to making decisions on these players, we’ve probably got three or four we’re very happy with.

‘Then the filtration process may be agents, clubs, players and all those sort of things.

‘By the time you get to it, you get one player on the list and go for that player.

‘It’s really interesting actually there’s a huge amount which goes into it.

‘For every signing we see externally, once upon a time that may have been a ‘shortlist’ in three figures. It really is (that many), but will slowly get whittled down.

‘To give an idea of that, if you look options through the leagues you will have the entirety of the under-21s league - the Premier League and some of the Championship sides.

‘Then you have a Championship loans list and players who are out of favour in the Championship. Then, I would say, it’s the better performers of League One and League Two along with the National League and National League South.

‘So there’s a huge pool of players, and then you can look at where we’ve gone this year in terms of Australia and we haven’t talked about Europe, while we have Northern Ireland and Ireland - both we’ve recruited from.

‘That’s just an example of where you might go to get your list of suitable players who are pretty good. Then you start working your way back from there.’

Mousinho explained that once the numbers of potential signings come down to around 20-25, the intensity of research escalates over those potential targets.

That will then see the process arrive at a stage where his personal involvement accelerates.

Mousinho added: ‘A lot of the players you can end up dismissing instantly, then you probably end up with a list of 20-25 the recruitment side have done a huge amount of work on. There will be three, four, five or six reports on every one of those players.

‘So that’s the next level of weening players out. They all seem suitable, but when you watch them live you get a real gauge on them.

‘Maybe then you see they are not at the level, or maybe sometimes even they are beyond the level - so you know not to waste time on them.

‘You get to the stage where the list gets shorter and shorter - and there’s five or six on there.

‘I’ve been involved in every stage of the process, but that’s when I will go watch those five or six players if possible because we become really serious about them. But even before that, it shows you there’s been a huge amount of work gone into it.’