GRAEME SOUNESS will have to work with what he already has at his disposal at Newcastle United but, claims chairman Freddy Shepherd, he should not expect miracles from his depleted squad.

Despite having a number of first-team regulars ruled out through injury, Souness has now been told there is no room for manoeuvre on the transfer front at all, meaning his hopes of landing a couple of loan targets have been dashed.

With no money available for signings of any kind during the transfer window, the Newcastle boss knows he will have to continue to operate with a depleted pool of players.

Souness' admission yesterday that he has no chance of strengthening his squad came just 24 hours after Shepherd's insistence that a top-six place is still a realistic target this season.

That means Newcastle, with a 17-man party today that includes three youngsters who boast just two starts between them, will have to drastically improve on the sort of form that has seen them pick maximum points up twice from their last nine outings.

Souness said: "Does it annoy me that I'm not going to be allowed to bring anybody in, even on loan? I'm no different to every other manager, even Jose Mourinho. I would like to have more players and better players, that's the nature of our business.

"None of them have the injury problems we have, but we have to live with it and deal with it. If there's somebody who could come along and magic away all our injuries with a wand then great, but it won't happen, we have to accept what we're working with.

"I know the chairman has been banging his drum about being positive and I am a positive person, to do this job you have to be positive. But I'm also a realist and I can also count up to 20.

"The reasons we're not winning games is because we've not got our best players out on the pitch. That's not an excuse, it's a fact. It's a reason, not an excuse, and people have to understand that."

With Michael Owen sidelined until at least late March with a broken metatarsal and Shola Ameobi given a week off with a hip problem, Souness had hoped to draft in Nicolas Anelka until the end of the season.

The Scot had also hoped to add a new centre-back to his ranks in a bid to solve the erratic nature of his side's defence, where Titus Bramble and Jean-Alain Boumsong have been prone to too many errors.

"We could do with one or two bodies in, we're short of numbers, certainly in the striker area and if anything happened to a centre half we'd be in trouble on that side," he said. "But, as I understand it, we have no money for anything so we'll have to soldier on with what we've got."

Hindsight suggests had the likes of Andy O'Brien and Aaron Hughes not been sold in the summer Newcastle would already have their defensive back-up in place.

But Souness insists the emergence of youngsters Peter Ramage and Steven Taylor, who is to miss the full season with a shoulder problem, were more than adequate replacements for that particular pair.

And the Newcastle boss, ahead of his former club Blackburn's visit to St James' Park today, is quite keen for the positive energy in the dressing room to be turned into performances on the pitch.

If that can be done he is hopeful more satisfactory results will be around the corner.

"You should always remain focused and be positive but I think it would be wrong of me to ignore the danger we face," said Souness, whose side are nine points above the drop zone.

"As a manager you have to be an optimist, but you shouldn't ignore the dangers; you have to slip into the darker mood from time to time and think what could go wrong.

"We are trying to look forward. That's always been the case with three points for a win, you can always put a run together and move quickly up the table.

"We should qualify for Europe as a club but you can't guarantee anything. If you win or qualify for Europe it's because you deserve it."

Since leaving Blackburn to take over from Sir Bobby Robson in September 2004, Souness' reign on Tyneside has not gone exactly to plan, with the knives sharpening by the game in recent months.

But at Ewood Park, under his successor Mark Hughes, Blackburn have bounced back from a poor start to climb to within three points of the top six.

And Souness said: "They're stubborn and difficult to play against because they work extremely hard. It'll be a hard game for us."

Newcastle are still in talks with Charlton over a fee for wantaway midfielder Lee Bowyer. Danny Murphy's name remains a possible player to exchange but Newcastle will not pay any extra cash to secure the deal.

l Former Newcastle striker Faustino Asprilla is hoping to make his name in politics in his homeland, Colombia.

The 36-year-old has announced his candidacy for the election as Deputy of the Valle del Cauca department in Cali. Asprilla will be part of a political union with the Rocio Arias party, who support the peace process between the Colombia government and paramilitary organisations