Minnesota United has signed three new players over the previous month, and head coach Eric Ramsay said Tuesday there’s potential for more to join them.

One target surfaced Friday.

The Loons are in “advanced negotiations” to sign 25-year-old Argentine attacking midfielder Joaquin Pereyra from Atletico Tucuman, a source confirmed to the Pioneer Press on Friday. South American reporter Cesar Luis Merlo said details still need to be completed on a proposed deal through the 2027 MLS season.

“As we said, we wanted to be very active this window with — we’ve made a decent start with the three that we have seen so far,” Ramsay said. “Hopefully we can build upon that, but it’s not always as straight forward as things might seem.”

Pereyra primarily plays as a left-sided midfielder and is known more for his creative playmaking than his goal-scoring. He also appears to be a willing defender who could help MNUFC press opponents higher up the field.

Pereyra has four assists and no goals in 742 minutes for Tucuman in 2024, according to fbref.com. He is in his fourth season with the Tucuman in Argentina’s Primera Division; he had four goal contributions in 2,224 minutes in the 2023 season and three goal contributions in 2,267 minutes in 2022.

At age 17, Pareyra’s professional career started at Rosario Central in Argentina, where he played sparingly in five seasons. He played for Famalicao in Portugal in 2020-21.

Two questions

The summer transfer window closes Wednesday, and burning questions remain for Chief Soccer Officer Khaled El-Ahmad.

What is his plan to upgrade the defensive midfield? And how does he plan to improve the squad within MLS?

El-Ahmad has added at center forward, wingback, center back and a winger — not including Pareyra — but MNUFC has yet to address the No. 6 role.

The Loons brought in Carlos Harvey and Alejandro Bran before the season, but the primary starters (when healthy and eligible) remain Wil Trapp and Hassani Dotson. Both Trapp, 31, and Dotson, 27, are in the last years of their contracts. The club holds options on both players for 2025.

If Pareyra’s transfer gets done, that would be another player to push the level of the first team and show how busy El-Ahmad has been this summer. While he’s not expected to revise the entire roster in 2024, a plan for defensive midfield is increasingly among the club’s biggest unknowns.

El-Ahmad traded away Wayzata native Caden Clark to CF Montreal this week, but he’s yet to acquire a player from within the league. There’s talent, potential, affordability and know-how within MLS and El-Ahmad needs to show where he sees value.

Newcomers availability

MNUFC and its three new players — striker Kelvin Yeboah, center back Jefferson Diaz and right wing back Matus Kmet — have been working on work visas with their respective countries.

“I know these things can take unexpected terms, but as I think things stand, hopefully Jefferson and Kelvin and Matus will be good to go for (training on) Monday,” Ramsay said. “And we will give them two clean weeks in the buildup to Seattle, and we will add what we can on top of that. That would be a nice position to be in for sure.”

The Loons are planning to have a to-be-determined friendly match on either Aug. 16 or 17 and then a full week build-up to the restart of MLS play versus Seattle Sounders at Allianz Field on Aug. 24.

Briefly

Sang Bin Jeong has been away from the club for a personal reason since July 23, but is expected to return early next week, Ramsay said. … The Loons had eight first-team players start the MNUFC2 match with The Town on Thursday: Trapp, Dotson, DJ Taylor, Zarek Valentin, Hugo Bacharach, Samuel Shashoua, Jordan Adebayo-Smith and Clint Irwin. MNUFC2 winger Loic Mesanvi smacked a long-range strike in the 1-1 draw. The Loons earned on additional point in penalty kicks. … MNUFC has sent striker Patrick Weah and midfielder Molik Jesse Khan on loan to HB Koge in Denmark for remainder of 2024 season. Weah, a homegrown signing in 2021, has not been able to consistently break into Loons’ first team. The Minneapolis man is out of contract at the end of the year.