Alex Neil is confident of bringing in two new hitmen to bolster his attack before the end of the summer transfer window.

City missed out on £12m Ross McCormack, who joined Championship rivals Aston Villa, but the Scot has already switched his attention to other targets.

'Firepower is the big thing for us. If we get a couple more strikers before the window ends, which we will do, then the rest of the team is as strong if not more so than the last time at this level,' he said. 'I still think we have a little bit of work to do in that area and we are confident of doing that. People only hear what is in the press but I can assure you behind the scenes we have numerous people we have been speaking to.'

Neil insists City were right not to get further involved in a high stakes auction for McCormack.

'It was a long drawn out process,' he said. 'Fulham made it more difficult than it needed to be and the levels it ended up getting to, to be honest, didn't make sense for us; although he is a good player and has a lot of goals in him where it got to priced us out of the market.

'When you are pursuing a target and that falls down you don't just sign the next target the following day. I am hopeful we will get some business done rather quickly in that position.'

Neil baulked at the suggestion City go into Saturday's opener at Blackburn light up front following the failure to land McCormack and the departure of Ricky van Wolfswinkel.

'Would we say we are light (up front) now? I would say we are not in the position we want to be,' he said. 'If we had signed McCormack three days or so ago then you wouldn't be saying that. I have Cameron Jerome, Kyle Lafferty, Carlton Morris and Steven Naismith, who has played as a nine in the past. I am not going into the Blackburn game with just one striker.'

Neil did add Alex Pritchard and Paul Jones to his squad this week after missing out on the ex-Fulham striker.

'It is a lot more complex than people think,' he said. 'It is not easy to go and take a club's best player. The upside when you bring in players is that freshness you get to your squad. The fans want to see that and the squad needs to have that.'