Pompey boss John Mousinho Burton Albion verdict

The News, Portsmouth

Pompey boss John Mousinho gives his verdict on the EFL League One win at Burton Albion

Transcript

00:00 John, bounce back, it was all about the win today, wasn't it, presumably, after Saturday?

00:07 In some ways, yes, but the performance was really important to me as well and obviously

00:11 the result is the most important thing, but we did want to make sure that if we were going

00:15 to be consistent through the season we put good performances in as well. I thought for

00:20 the most part, apart from a mad ten minutes in the second half, I thought we were really

00:25 good. My only disappointment was that we didn't put the game to bed with a bit more comfort

00:29 towards the back end. We didn't necessarily have a huge amount of chances, but it was

00:32 the positions we put ourselves in, the opportunities we had to create something and test their

00:37 goalkeeper. But off the back of the weekend, with the disappointment, the blow to morale,

00:42 having conceded four clean sheets, three points away from home on a very, very cold Tuesday

00:46 night, it's really pleasing.

00:48 Do you learn anything about your side from tonight as well?

00:51 In a way, yes, because it's the first time we've been tested like this and it was a very,

00:56 very different feeling at the training ground yesterday, naturally, because we'd lost a

01:00 league game and it was about how we reacted. So, in a way, I've learned something about

01:06 the lads, but I say this now, I also knew that it was going to be a game that they reacted

01:12 in positively because I've seen how the boys have been since the first day of pre-season.

01:18 This group is a very, very good group. I think there's some excellent leaders in there. So,

01:23 I think the resolve that they've shown to come through in a pretty tricky period and

01:28 a lot of people thinking, 'Oh, maybe this is Portsmouth dropping off', I think it was

01:32 an excellent night for all of those lads involved.

01:35 And then some of the lads bounced back as well, Sparks left back particularly. A lot

01:40 of good performances tonight after Saturday.

01:42 Yes, brilliant. We spoke to Jack yesterday about Saturday and that's going to happen,

01:49 right? You're going to get times when you come up against really good wingers and they

01:52 give you a problem and there was probably a period in the second half there where Jack

01:56 was under a bit of pressure. The most pleasing things that he didn't go under and then I

02:00 think for the last half hour I didn't see the right-hand side really create anything

02:03 at all. He was aggressive, he worked hard, he did his best to keep the winger out of

02:09 the box and like I said, a really positive comeback and to keep a clean sheet as well

02:14 after the whole back five.

02:16 Obviously, Colby Bishop injury overshadows tonight as well. What's the situation, please?

02:20 I think that's the only negative of the night really. He went over on his ankle right in

02:23 front of the bench here and I saw it straight away. I saw his weight go over on his ankle,

02:29 on his left ankle. A really frustrating one obviously for us. It doesn't look brilliant

02:35 but his ankle's swollen up. It's one of those ones I think we're really, really unlucky

02:38 with. There's nothing we can do about it. It wasn't a bad challenge, the pitch is fine.

02:44 Colby's very resilient so we'll have to see how that pans out over the next couple of

02:48 days.

02:49 Is he going to be in a boot at the end of the game and uncrutch his?

02:51 Yes, so that's just precautionary. It's not to say that there's not an injury there. He's

02:55 definitely injured but as a precaution you want to make sure you take as much weight

02:58 off that ankle as possible and we'll review it over the next couple of days.

03:01 You could see he tried to run it off for a few minutes as well but it wasn't right.

03:04 Yes, I thought probably straight away that he wasn't going to be right but what we wanted

03:09 to do was just, we had two minutes to half-time and just make sure we got through and made

03:12 the right decision in terms of the substitution. We knew that Colby would go out there and

03:16 give us a couple of minutes and it wouldn't make it any worse. He's already turned over

03:20 his ankle. He wanted to just try it out anyway. He is a warrior. It takes a lot to get Colby

03:27 off the pitch and unfortunately tonight he's ended up on the bad side of them.

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