Portsmouth boss John Mousinho: My toughest Fratton Park season
The Blues’ head coach has spent three-and-a-half years on the south coast after joining from Oxford United
John Mousinho reflected on yet again keeping Pompey in the Championship and admitted: This has been my toughest Fratton Park season yet.
The Blues clinched survival with two matches to spare on Tuesday night, despite suffering a 5-1 hammering at title-winning Coventry.
Oxford’s 1-0 defeat to Wrexham, meant they can no longer finish ahead of Mousinho’s men, while Leicester were relegated to League One on the same night after drawing to Hull.
Since arriving as Danny Cowley’s successor as head coach in January 2023, the ever-impressive Mousinho has overseen the capture of the League One title and now two successful relegation battles.
This term has seen huge injury problems, including to key players such as Josh Murphy, while the 6-1 Loftus Road hammering remains a dreadful low.
Regardless, Pompey’s Championship place for 2026-27 has been reserved.
‘A very, very good achievement’
Mousinho told The News: ‘It has felt this season was the toughest of my time here.
‘What we had at the back end of last year was that fully-fit squad to select from, we had a front four of Murph, Colby, Adil (Aouchiche), Langy at times, and Matt Ritchie - all firing.
‘We've had to chop and change that and try to find different solutions to various problems. Then we lost Terry (Devlin) on Saturday, who was our Players’ Player of the Season, Keshi had come in and done brilliantly well.
‘In fairness to all of the lads, they have come in and stepped up throughout the season. There have been a lot of very, very good and important performances from the entire squad to remain at a level which is extremely difficult to stay up.
‘Before Coventry, we had book ended five brilliant performances - and I genuinely mean five brilliant performances. Since January 1, Norwich were the best side in the league on form. We went to Carrow Road and got a point there, we deserved it.
‘We then got that point against Oxford when everything went against us in the game in terms of those referring decisions. We beat Middlesbrough, who had been second for pretty much all season. Then we beat Ipswich, who have automatic promotion in their own hands.
‘Leicester are down there, but their team is absolutely ridiculous in terms of the talent they have. To do that with all the circumstances around being post-QPR, the injuries, the schedule of that extra game.
‘I do look at that even now and I think it is a very, very good achievement.’
Despite the outcome of Oxford’s clash with high-flying Wrexham pivotal on Tuesday night, Mousinho opted against scoreline updates in the first half.
However, that changed at half-time, when analyst Ed Denton informed the head coach that Josh Windass’ goal had handed the Welsh club the lead.
For Mousinho, how that match was faring also had an impact on his substitutes, with Murphy subsequently given 28 minutes off the bench, representing his first action since December.
‘An absolutely brutal last 20 minutes’
Mousinho explained: ‘I didn’t look at Oxford’s score until half-time. The reason why I wanted to know the score at that point was to inform some of my decisions in the second half.
‘Murph being a good one. My talk to Murph was if we need you on Saturday, do you want to get minutes tonight? Or do you not want to get minutes? He wanted to get that run out against Coventry.
‘It’s decisions like that, while protecting Colby at the back end when the game was, for all intents and purposes, over.
‘It was over at 4-1. At 3-1 we had half a chance if we managed to nick another, not that we deserved it.
‘It was an absolutely brutal last 20 minutes of the game, I didn’t enjoy it one bit.’