Exeter City face a race against time to get David Noble back into the first team squad to play Accrington Stanley on Saturday.
Noble has missed the last three City games as his emergency loan deal from Oldham Athletic ran out prior to the match against Stevenage on December 20.
He has signed a permanent contract at St James's Park, but with the January transfer window not due to open until 12am on Saturday it leaves City little time to get the deal ratified by the Football Association and the Football League.
The deadline to register players to be involved in FA Cup action this weekend is at 12pm on Friday, which would have been too early to allow Noble to feature.
However, as the Grecians are involved in a League game, manager Paul Tisdale is confident all the necessary paper work will be completed in time.
"It is all signed, it just has to be registered at the Football League," said Tisdale. "We are working on it going through. I can't believe the Football League will have a situation where it is too much for them to cope with on a Saturday morning.
"If he is not registered on time it will be a farcical situation from their point for view."
Tisdale is understandably keen to get Noble registered for the game.
He played the full 90 minutes of City's 3-2 win away at Stanley in late November, has been an integral part of the side in the past couple of months and is the ideal player to fill the gap left by Matt Grimes – assuming his move to Premier League Swansea City goes through.
"It will be a big plus to have him back," said Tisdale. "We have missed him in the last two or three games. He is a pivotal part of our team.
"He is instrumental to the way we play and he is a big part of our team so it is important we get him back as soon as possible."
City go into the match on the back of some good results at St James's Park.
They are now unbeaten in six at home and have dispatched high-flying Wycombe Wanderers and league leaders Shrewsbury Town in that time.
After Accrington, Exeter play Northampton Town at the Park. Therefore the start of January represents a good opportunity to move up into the play-off places – the Grecians currently find themselves outside the top seven on goal difference only.
However, Tisdale said there was no rush on City's part and as long as they kept up the form they have shown since the start of September then they would be in a good place in the table come the end of the season.
"There is plenty of opportunity in the second half of the season," he said. "The next couple of games are always important though and it is nice to have good home form so we will aim to keep that because it does give you some consistency.
"I think it is a good point to make that we are trying to build on our home form, but there are plenty of opportunities over the next 20-odd games to develop our team.
"I think we have had a good first half of the season considering the awful start we had during August. If we can keep the form going that we have shown from the start of September then we will be in a good position this season."
