Keith Curle waiting to see if Carlisle Utd can strike loan deal for Alex Gilliead

Blues boss Keith Curle is still waiting to learn whether Carlisle United can thrash out a loan deal for Newcastle's Alex Gilliead.

The Toon winger is among several targets ahead of Wednesday's transfer deadline.

Curle hopes the lure of first-team football can tempt Gilliead out of Newcastle's Under-21s and back to Brunton Park for a second spell.

The United manager said: "We posted an interest at this end, now it's down to the club to speak to their opposite numbers at Newcastle and find out if there is a potential deal to be had."

Curle would not say how many additions he is seeking this week - but insisted he wanted to be active in the market.

He added: "You can rest assured a lot of hard work, phonecalls, monitoring of players and gathering of data is happening to try and fill voids that I think is needed to take us to the next window.

"We haven't got to do all our shopping now, but we've got a dossier of about 14 players that ideally we think could improve us.

"The availability of those players can change even over the weekend."

Curle is also believed to be keen to strengthen in attack and at full-back.

The Blues boss, meanwhile, says Jason Kennedy should be back in contention soon after the midfielder missed a second game with a knee injury.

"I'm hoping he'll be available for [tomorrow night] - he's had an injection and just needs that to settle down," Curle said.