Tottenham manager Ange Postecoglou has insisted the club will do their transfer business earlier in the month after being hit by another injury.
Defender Cristian Romero is set to miss the whole of January after a hamstring strain.
The Argentine defender joins Micky van de Ven, Rodrigo Bentancur and James Maddison in the injury list. Spurs have struggled in the Premier League with some of their key players missing.
Spurs are set to lose three of their players to continental tournaments soon. Yves Bissouma, Pape Sarr and captain Son Heung-min will be heading off for international duty at the Africa Cup of Nations and Asian Cup.
Postecoglou wants his club to make the most of the transfer window and start their business early.
He said:
“Obviously if we can do business early, it’s great for us. Not just because of losing Romero but there’s a whole month there – why waste it?
“If you can bring them in early, even if they don’t play you can bed them into training and our style of football because it’s not like we’re going to sign somebody and they’ll hit the ground running.
“Whereas if you leave it towards the end of January, it’s potentially not until mid to end of February when they get up to speed, depending where they’re coming from, the league they’re coming from, so there’s a whole lot of moving parts.
“So, yes, I’d love to do something early in the window but even me saying that puts a challenge on us, because other clubs know we want to do something early.
“You’ve got to play the game, we’ll see what happens but I’m hopeful it will be much earlier than the end of the window before we bring someone in.”