Exclusive:Frustrated John Mousinho addresses Portsmouth winger jinx after left reeling by latest casualty
The former Wellington Phoenix winger has made four appearances since joining the Blues in July
Pompey’s winger jinx has struck once more - and John Mousinho is adamant nothing can be done to prevent such injuries.
During Tuesday’s training session, summer signing Luke Brooke-Smith dislocated his left ankle and broke a fibula, while potentially also has ligament damage.
According to Mousinho it was a ‘pretty innocuous challenge’, nonetheless the unfortunate 18-year-old will be sidelined for the foreseeable future.
The Blues are no strangers to winger set-backs, with Josh Murphy, Keshi Anderson and Franco Umeh also still sidelined after collecting long-term injuries since the summer.
In addition, Harvey Blair has suffered an injury-ravaged two years on the south coast, restricting him to just 29 appearances, with Pompey now attempting to offload him.
For Mousinho, though, Brooke-Smith represents a fresh blow which couldn’t be prevented.
‘With Luke there was nothing we could do.’
He told The News: ‘It was a pretty innocuous challenge in training. A blocked shot and Luke’s ankle unfortunately has somehow been caught underneath it.
‘We’ve reviewed that time and time again, it’s a really, really unfortunate incident, there’s nothing you can do about it. The only thing you can do about it is go non-contact in training - and we are never, ever going to do that.
‘Unfortunately we’ve had periods and spells where we’ve had quite a few injuries to wingers. Probably the other area where we’ve had a lot of injuries during my time at the football club is centre-backs.
‘Nothing to do with Luke’s case, his was just an unfortunate accident, but the way we want wingers to play is with that high output. Sometimes with that there’s the strain it puts on the body. With the output we are asking from these players, unfortunately sometimes they do break down.
‘You can avoid contact injuries by doing non-contact, you can probably avoid muscular and ligament injuries by not sprinting and not being at top pace at the time. However, we want our wingers to play in a certain way.
‘With Luke there was nothing we could do. We’ll replay that 1,000 times, we can’t change training sessions, we can’t change the contact in sessions. Luke knows that, the lads know that and it’s just one of those massive downsides of contact sports.
‘It’s nothing to do with the training ground pitches, they are in great nick at the moment.’
After sustaining the injury on Tuesday morning, Brooke-Smith was taken to QA Hospital, before being discharged that same evening.
Surgery is now expected, although Mousinho believes it is too early to put a timeframe on when the New Zealand international could return to football.
‘It’s a bit more complex because of the fracture in there’
Mousinho added: ‘At this stage, I don’t know how long Luke will be out.
‘If you are looking at purely ankle ligament damage it’s about 10-12 weeks, but it’s a bit more complex than that because of the fracture in there. I’m hoping it’s not anything that goes beyond Christmas time. I will have to wait to see what the specialist says.
‘At the time it didn't look great, but I am much more positive now than I was. Will he play again this season? I hope so.’