West Bromwich Albion chief Dan Ashworth has put George Thorne on notice.
The midfielder is expected to make a big impact at the Hawthorns.
"We lost both Paul (Scharner) and Keith Andrews so we wanted to add a couple more central midfield players," said Ashworth, who has overseen Thorne's progress through the academy ranks since persuading him to leave Cambridge to join the Baggies.
"With Claudio (Yacob) coming in and George coming back from Portsmouth after getting 15 or 20 Championship games, hopefully they will be ample replacements for Paul and Keith," said Ashworth.