Portsmouth boss answers continuing questions over Conor Shaughnessy’s injury after latest training ground setback

And the Blues boss is adamant the club’s training ground facilities stand up to inspection, as the defender added his name to the list of those sidelined at their Hilsea base.

Mousinho has moved to explain at length his thoughts on the Shaughnessy blow, after he was ruled out for the rest of the year with a new calf issue.

The head coach has previously dealt with talk of a bust-up with the 28-year-old, ridiculing the suggestion there was an incident with the man who signed a new three-year deal in July.

Now there’s frustration at Shaughnessy’s situation with no clear answers, but Mousinho is certain the right questions are being asked.

He said: ‘We look into every single injury.

‘It can be difficult to properly figure anything out sometimes, injuries can be like that. You can look at a thousand different things and you’re trying to find answers and solutions.

‘We try to be as objective as possible and come up with solutions to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

‘Sometimes muscular injuries can be really strange. With contact injuries or things like ACLs or MCLs there’s always something which triggers it. With muscular injuries it can be absolutely nothing sometimes and that’s the really frustrating thing.

‘Jordan Williams is a good example. Jordan played against Plymouth and had been back in training for a while, played half an hour against Hull and was fine. Then he picks up a hamstring injury which we thought was pretty innocuous but turned out to be a lot worse than we thought.

‘That was a head scratcher and Shaughs falls into the same category.

‘We are the ones who ask questions the most.

‘Sometimes they are really simple to figure out and then you go back to the player and work on certain weaknesses and certain imbalances. It’s really obvious. We’re always looking out for those ones when we pick them up.

‘In games in can be a bit more random but you look at did you travel right and did you eat right? You look at that preparation and you look at if that player was ready to play that game.

‘You look at the two injuries at Chesterfield last year - we went over and over them. Was Tino ready to start two games in nine days? We were really confident he was. Then Regan has that freak one and goes over on his ACL.

‘We don’t like to speak about players at other clubs, but Sean Raggett was never injured when he was here - now all of a sudden he’s hardly played. It’s just one of those weird things.

‘We look at it as much as we can and we try to be objective, but sometimes you just have to say it can’t be helped.’

Pompey dealt with extensive injuries last season, with a number of issues suffered at their own training ground this term.

Kusini Yengi was sidelined after a collision with Christian Saydee there last term, while Alex Robertson’s season was ended after suffering a major hamstring issue in January.

This season Jacob Farrell has twice been sidelined there along with Tom McIntyre, while Ibane Bowat’s season was finished days after his £500,000 signing after taking an unopposed shot in training. Yengi and Shaughnessy were also injured in warm-ups at Fratton Park this season.

Mousinho added: ‘The thing I’d say about that is I think our training pitches are excellent.

‘If you look at some of the training pitches I’ve played and trained on over the years, pitches these days are immaculate.

‘Look at the training pitches here as you drive past or go to the gym, you can see they’re in really good condition.

‘It’s always frustrating when you pick up injuries, but I don’t look at the training pitches and think that’s the reason. If it was we’d never have a squad. With the intensity and levels that we train at every day, if there was an issue with the pitches there’d be no chance we’d get 11 players out at the weekend.’

Mousinho has also drawn context from other teams who are now facing up to a similar tale of injury woe experienced during different periods of his managerial tenure at PO4.

He said: ‘It always seems when you’re in it that it’s worse for your football club and you have bad luck.

‘If you speak to any manager up and down the country, sometimes it’s okay and sometimes it’s a disaster.

‘There’s a really good example. I was watching West Brom v Burnley the other day and West Brom’s back four and (Darnell) Furlong was the only defender in their back four from when they played us. It’d been totally flipped on its head and they had Callum Styles playing left-back.

‘They had that injury crisis: it happens and it happens at bad times.

‘We’ve had that at times this season and other teams have had it, then sometimes it’s felt like we’ve had a full squad to pick from.

‘I do think it’s something you get through the Football League and right up to the top. Man City are really struggling with the amount of injuries they’ve picked up, and I’m pretty sure that’s not because of their training ground - it’s just one of those things which happen.