The club yesterday lost an appeal to allow 23-year-old Honduran midfielder Hendry Thomas, who plays for Olimpia in his homeland, to join them.

That decision annoyed Bruce, who is now back to square one in his search for reinforcements in central midfield, where he currently only has Michael Brown and Thomas' international team-mate Wilson Palacios.

"We are disappointed because we did our homework over the summer for Hendry Thomas, a midfielder who plays alongside Palacios on the Honduras team," said Bruce.

"We have worked so hard on that over the last three or four months, agreed a fee, been out to Miami, been out to Honduras and parts of South America to try to tie the boy up and unfortunately he hasn't met the work permit criteria.

"We are absolutely devastated we didn't get that, we lost it on appeal yesterday. We had that one pencilled in as one of our midfield players so we will have to look again.

"We have been kicked in the teeth. It saddens me for all the work the club has done. You get all that done and because of a little red tape we have lost out.

"I only have two recognised central midfielders in Brown and Palacios so we will have to look to strengthen that area."

Bruce said defensive midfielder Thomas was not granted a work permit because he had not played the required number of matches for his country.

However, the Latics felt they had a genuine case as Thomas is captain of Honduras' Olympic team, which is playing in Beijing next month, and had been playing mostly for that side.

Bruce said: "Because he played in the Olympic team, he didn't play in the national team. That ended up counting against him as it is not a [FIFA] registered competition like a World Cup.

"He played for the Olympic team because the Honduras national association ploughed all their efforts into that because it took precedence because they had never been to the Olympics before.

"That stopped him playing for the [full] national team and you need appearances for the national team to meet the criteria."

Bruce also waded into the Cristiano Ronaldo debate and the controversy sparked by FIFA president Sepp Blatter's comments about players being like slaves.

Real Madrid have openly courted Ronaldo through the media, much to the indignation and annoyance of United manager Sir Alex Ferguson, who believes he has the security of the contract his star signed last year.

The FIFA president said if players wanted to leave their clubs, they should be able to do so providing their employers were adequately recompensed.

He likened Ronaldo's situation to slavery, suggesting United were preventing him from leaving against his will.

However, with no formal offer from Madrid - although it would be rejected out of hand by United anyway - the player's situation should be unchanged, but feverish and sustained speculation has only contributed to the problem.

Bruce, however, believes Blatter is wrong in speaking out about players' contractual obligations.

"I don't agree with Sepp Blatter's comments on them being slaves because I believe they have the best job in the world," he said.

"If they are slaves, what the hell are the rest of us? They have got a good job."