Tony Mowbray revealed Rovers have missed out on transfer targets because of an embargo which has been the reason for a slow start to business at Ewood Park.

Rovers are yet to make any new additions to their squad but have confirmed they are now free of a registration embargo they were previously working under.

That prevented Rovers from pressing on with any targets that had been identified, but Mowbray is hoping that will now change as he looks to add new faces to a squad depleted by the departure of five loanees and six out-of-contract players.

After confirming the embargo had prevented Rovers from making signings, Mowbray told the Lancashire Telegraph: “We have to have targets and the frustration is that we haven’t been able to engage with them because we wouldn’t have been able to push them forward or get them over the line.

“That work starts now, there’s some positions that very definitely need strengthening at our football club and we’ll be doing our very best over the next month.

“We’ve lost one or two people because of that.

“When teams are back training they want a club, they see teams starting to play games and they want a team so there’s a bit of anxiety from players who haven’t got a team because they want a contract.

“There’s lots of players out there, we have to try and find the right ones with the finance we’ve got and what we can pay.”

Rovers returned to pre-season training last month and will be back on the Brockhall training pitches this week after a six-day trip to Stirling prior to Saturday’s pre-season friendly at AFC Fylde.

While Rovers don’t have a public friendly until the trip to Bradford City on July 24, they will continue their preparations with behind closed doors matches before then.

As for the transfer market, Rovers are one of six Championship sides yet to make a signing, and Mowbray expects a trickle down effect to begin once Euro 2020 is over.

There are gaps in the squad that need filling after the departure of 11 players from last season’s squad, and with senior faces missing at Fylde, it forced Rovers to dip into their Under-23s squad.

“The difficulty for me is that the five loans went back, five or six players left at the end of their contract and we’ve been unable to sign any players,” Mowbray added.

“The team is what it is, a lot of young boys, but it’s good to work with young players because they’re very enthusiastic, fit but let’s be realistic, we’re not going to win many Championship matches with the young team we had out there, we need to recruit some footballers.”