Transfer news: Blackburn confirm goalkeeper interest plus clarity regarding Middlesbrough man's future

Rovers were linked with Pears earlier in the window but have since brought in 21-year-old Antonis Stergiakis from Slavia Sofia to challenge first-choice keeper Thomas Kaminski.

Yet it’s also been claimed there are plans for Stergiakis to train with the under-23 team, leaving a void to fill between the sticks.

Asked whether he still wants to sign a keeper on Thursday, Mowbray told LancsLive : "Yes. We're working hard every day, making phone calls. When you say you work hard, they're phone calls.

"A 10, 20 minute phone call and a discussion. You bounce around with your staff and your executives and then you go back with another call and say you can't do this, but you can do this and what about that?

"That's how busy busy is. But we're trying to add to our squad, yes.

"Another goalkeeper makes sense to me and so we're only trying to build up our stable of goalkeepers really, so that we have experience and up and coming young ones that can compete against each other.”

Pears appears to be third-choice goalkeeper at Boro behind new signing Marcus Bettinelli and Dejan Stojanovic.

One man who now looks set to stay at the Riverside is Marcus Browne, despite Boro boss Neil Warnock saying the 22-year-old probably needs to leave on loan again.

League One club Oxford would have been interested in re-signing Browne, who impressed during his two loan spells at the Kassam Stadium, yet manager Karl Robinson says a move won’t materialise.

"Maybe Marcus is playing well in training and they’ve looked at it as an opportunity to keep him around the building,” Robinson told the Oxford Mail.

"Neil Warnock is much better at this job than I am and I think he knows what he’s doing. I’ll leave that to him.

"We just know he’s not available, that’s come from the football club and the staff.

"If he becomes successful there it will be something we’ll be proud of because he’s a good kid."

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