Albion have sent out a clear message to clubs looking to snap up their top talent in January.

Deputy chairman and chief executive Paul Barber has shot down talk of players being offered to rivals as “absolute nonsense”.

While realistic their players will be of interest, the Seagulls are keen to keep all on board throughout the window, which opens tomorrow.

Barber, who has been made an OBE in the New Year’s honours list, told The Argus: “We have not offered anyone to anyone and have no plans to.

“In an ideal world our squad, which is as good as it has been for a long time, will remain intact through the whole of January and we will go into the second half of the season as we are.

“The next 30-odd days is unpredictable and we will deal with whatever comes in. But we are not offering anyone to anyone.”

Asked whether there had been contact over their players, Barber said: “No - and we don’t want any.

“We are quite happy as we are, certainly for as long as we can be. But we are also realistic.

“Alexis Mac Allister has just won a World Cup at 23 years of age and has had a fantastic season with us.

“We know there is going to be interest in Alexis.

“We know Moises Caicedo is one of the top talents.

“We know Rob Sanchez is one of the world’s best young goalkeepers.

“This is normal, this is the world we wanted to operate in and this is the world we ARE operating in.

“We can’t be surprised when there is interest and at some point we have to accept that these players will go on to play at an even higher level than ours.

“But, at the moment, we are going well.

“We are looking forward to the rest of the season and we want to try and keep our group together.”