Why we may spend much of the summer waiting for Portsmouth transfer business

The online gifs speak of an impatience among supporters, as they wait for their football club to complete its first transfer business of the summer.

Meanwhile, us journalists are crying out for the sustenance of a done deal to give the summer story count a shot in the arm.

And then to rub salt in the wounds, the man Pompey spent most of last summer chasing, Eisa, signs for one of their League One rivals in a seven-figure deal.

Tomorrow will bring up the first anniversary of Craig MacGillivray being unveiled after he left Shrewsbury.

The keeper was the third of the summer additions following Louis Dennis and Ronan Curtis’ arrival, as Kenny Jackett undertook what he felt was some necessary major surgery of his options.

Of course, Eisa being rolled out at Peterborough wouldn’t have helped those fans getting twitchy, as they crave a done deal to feast on.

Eisa's record arrival at London Road for a fee north of £1.25m was a piece of business which reverberated around League One, and certainly would’ve been felt at PO4.

The deal is one which has the desired effect in showing the Posh mean business under Darren Ferguson in their bid to reach the Championship.

The reality is, however, Pompey possess the clout to shell out a similar kind of fee for the right player should they desire.

That’s always been the case since Michael Eisner arrived at the club, underlined by the fact Kenny Jackett was in for Eisa last year before his eventual £1.5m move for Bristol City.

Fortunately, for the club’s American chairman, he has a manager who spends his money like it was his own. Not all former Pompey owners have been so fortunate.

As chief executive Mark Catlin has gone to great lengths to stress there, is flexibility in the playing budget to push the boat out for the right addition, in a clear and emphatic riposte to those who’ve asked questions about the club’s ambition this summer.

Of course, everyone associated with Pompey would like a big-bucks addition holding a Blues scarf aloft to lift the spirits, especially as we attempt to shake off the play-off hangover.

But this isn’t a squad requiring a major overhaul.

Last time around there were 10 fresh faces arriving. This time there’s room for up to four players to lift the level of Jackett’s squad, with the caveat outgoings will lift that number.

With Peterborough possessing a new manager they aren’t in a dissimilar position to the one Pompey found themselves in a year ago.

A glance around the rest of the division suggests there aren’t many others to match the six deals chairman Darragh MacAnthony has sanctioned so far.

Rest assured, the work is taking place behind the scenes. Few can match Jackett either for the standards he demands when it comes to his team’s recruitment business, or the voracity of his appetite to getting the job done to the highest standards.

As the Pompey manager himself states, he doesn’t take too kindly to being surprised when a rival unveils a new signing he wasn’t aware was happening.

So we will wait. And it may be the case that much of this summer is about waiting.

But that may not be a bad thing when the rules of the transfer game this time around is about bridging the narrow margin between failure and success.