'Not sure' - Portsmouth boss John Mousinho admits on-loan Sunderland attacker Adil Aouchiche might have played last game for club
Adil Aouchiche might have played his last game for Pompey.
Blues head coach John Mousinho has admitted he’s not sure whether he’ll play the on-loan Sunderland attacking midfielder again after he suffered a wrist injury against Norwich on Good Friday.
The fracture forced him off in the 85th minute at Carrow Road, with Mousinho hailing the Frenchman’s display that day as his best in a Pompey shirt following his arrival in January.
Aouchiche was then handed another start against Watford on Monday as the Blues looked to confirm their Championship safety. However, he was replaced at half-time by Christian Saydee as he struggled to cope with the injury.
Now, according to his manager, there’s doubts whether the 22-year-old will add to the 12 games he’s already clocked up against Sheffield Wednesday on Saturday and Hull’s visit to Fratton Park on the final day of the season.
Speaking to The News on Wednesday, Mousinho said: ‘Aouchiche had the fracture prviously, he tried to play with it (against Watford) and it just wasn’t right. So I don’t think we’ll see Adil play at the weekend.
‘He’s fine, the injury is the same, it’s just a case of trying to test it to see if can play with it.
‘It’s one of those things, it doesn’t obviously affect him football-wise, but he can’t hold players off, can’t properly close players down, can’t really go into challenges and I think that plays on your mind and that starts to affect the playing side as well.
‘I’m not sure we’ll risk him inless he’s 100-per-cent.’
In other injury news, Mousinho confirmed both Jacob Murphy and Colby Bishop are fine for this weekend’s trip to Hillsborough after they were both substituted in the second half against Watford with knocks.
However, he confirmed Jordan Williams will miss the rest of the season with a hamstring injury - a setback that will see him receive treatment for the next 6-8 weeks.
Adil Aouchiche’s time at Pompey
Aouchiche joined Pompey late in the winter transfer window as the Blues looked to enhance their attacking threat over the second half of the Champiomnship season.
The player was also keen on more regular game time after featuring just eight times for Regis Le Bris’ Stadium of Light side ahead of his move to the south coast.
During his time at Fratton Park, Aouchiche has played on the right wing and through the middle, and has made Mousinho’s starting XI on nine occasions.
His only goal came in the 2-1 defeat to Plymouth Argyle on March 12, while his single assist for the Blues came in last Friday’s 5-3 hammering of Norwich at Carrow Road.
His presence in the starting line-up against the Canaries was just his second in five games. But Mousinho loved what he saw from the former PSG youngster.
He said: ‘It was Adil’s best game for us by a long way, I said it to Jon (Harley) and Ed (Denton) on the bench. I thought he was excellent.
‘He put both bits together. What we’ve seen with Adil is a huge amount of work-rate, which is maybe slightly surprising to some.
‘We knew we were going to get the work-rate, but we’ve got this technical 10 coming in from Sunderland and some from the outside may not have expected that.
‘He hasn’t quite put together both the work-rate and the quality on the ball. Maybe there have been a couple of games, particularly against QPR in the second half - and he did it against Norwich.
‘He showed that quality on the ball, coming out of tight areas, his work-rate was constant, he was dead on his feet at the end. His numbers were through the roof, but he also gave that edge on the ball.
‘Hopefully it will boost his confidence going forward. He’s a confident young lad anyway, he’s been in and out of the side, and we felt it was the right thing to do to bring him back on Friday. I thought he was great.’
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