ALBION are ready to dip into the transfer market in January to boost their chances of promotion to the Premier League.

Boss Gus Poyet and chairman Tony Bloom have agreed a strategy for the re-opening of the transfer window next month.

They will make a move, provided they are convinced any new player will improve the team.

The Seagulls are tenth, three points outside the play-offs, going into the Boxing Day visit to seventh-placed Reading, which signals the halfway point of the Championship season.

Poyet told The Argus: “We know where we are. It will depend on a few things that need to happen in the next two or three weeks but if it’s clear it’s the right player, then we will. If it’s a maybe then sometimes I think it’s better to keep getting better and more solid altogether.

“We are missing little things. If we can add those two or three little things to the team we should be better and that’s the idea.

“We’ll see, it’s not easy. January is a transfer window we don’t really like. Sometimes you are panicking and rushing your decisions.

“If there is one player available that three or four clubs want, you chase him without really knowing if he is the perfect one. During the summer you’ve got more time but that’s the way it is.”

African striker Habib Habibou completes an extended trial with Albion today after scoring for the development squad in a friendly at Brentford on Tuesday.

Poyet said: “It’s very difficult for trialists. Sometimes you feel sorry for them because they need to show what they can do in just a few days with people they don’t know or maybe on a terrible pitch or in a friendly game.

“He’s been good, so we are going to do a few things with him just to confirm.”

The 6ft 4in Habib, 24, is resportedly available on loan from Belgian club Zulte Waregem but Poyet said: “There are many options. We’ll see which is the best one. We haven’t really gone there yet, because first we need to see if he is the player that we need.”