Jack Ross fully expects Kevin Nisbet and Ryan Porteous to line up for his team on Saturday after Hibernian knocked back big-money offers for the pair.
Birmingham are reported to have lodged a £2million offer for 13-goal striker Nisbet while Millwall are rumoured to have made a £1million bid for Scotland squad member Porteous.
But Ross is pleased to see Leith chairman Ron Gordon holding out for a better deal as he insisted both are in his plans for the trip to Dundee United.
“The club has had some stronger interest in players over the last couple of days,” he said. “It’s accelerated a little bit.
“But as we are, both trained with us today and are in the squad for tomorrow. I don’t see that changing over the next 24 hours – but I can’t say that for certain.
“They are also in my plans for St Mirren on Tuesday but I’m sensible enough to know that could change very quickly.
“Selfishly as a manager you want to keep your best players but I also accept we have to continue to progress the club in the most effective manner from an economic point of view.
“The only thing that accentuates the desire to keep them is the timing. Ask any manager, if you’re going to lose important players you’d rather do it earlier in the window than later. As the window obviously closes over the weekend it makes it a little more challenging.
“What does it say about Ron that he is holding out for what he sees as the players’ true value? It helps me and probably gives supporters the comfort that the owner is in it for the longer term.
“We’re trying to build something over a longer period but there is always the right time and the right value to move the club forward.”
Ross, who confirmed Stevie Mallan’s move to Turkish side Yeni Malatyaspor has fallen through, does not plan to make any additions of his own before Monday’s transfer deadline – but acknowledged that could change if either Nisbet or Porteous depart.
He said: “There’s nothing imminent. We have explored strengthening an area but there hasn’t been the right player to do that.
“However, we have tried to come up with a plan should we lose any of our players and we have that in place. But it is more likely we won’t do anything than we will.
“However, if there comes a time in the near future where we do bring in funds then I’m sure the club would be supportive of us re-investing some of that.”
‘Arteta, Alonso, Emery, me… none of us were physical players – we needed the understanding of the game. That probably helped us move into management’: Premier League boss reveals reasons for natural career progression
‘England have the players to win the World Cup – it’ll be tough for Thomas Tuchel to do a bad job, with the squad he has at his disposal’ Former Three Lions winger backs new boss after gentle qualifying draw
