Portsmouth boss John Mousinho adamant centre-forwards can thrive in his playing system
The Blues have scored five goals from the centre-forward position so far this season - compared to six last term
John Mousinho is convinced centre-forwards can thrive in his Pompey playing system - despite ongoing goal concerns.
The Blues continue to overachieve, presently threatening to mount a surprise play-off challenge during an impressive run of one defeat in nine matches.
Scoring, however, remains a worry, particularly over those challenged to occupy the lone striker role in the head coach’s preferred formation.
This term, Colby Bishop, Marko Milovanovic, Thomas Waddingham and Tyrese Shade have netted five goals between them in all competitions.
Last season, Bishop, Waddingham, Jacob Brown and Makenzie Kirk totalled six over the entire 2025-26 campaign.
And with just seven Championship goals from open play from Pompey centre-forwards since August 2025, it remains a concern among supporters.
‘It’s more about the quality of chances we feed the centre-forward’
Mousinho told The News: ‘The system I’ve played has largely been the same over the past few years.
‘If you look at last season and this season in its infancy, centre-forwards have scored a couple of goals. We’ve got five between the three.
‘Last year fine, we didn’t score enough, but the year before that we had plenty of goals at centre-forward. The year before that (2023-24) Colby scored 21, the year before that he got 24.
‘There’s less of an issue with the system. It’s a very, very similar system to Swansea, who have Zan Vipotnik up top, who was top scorer with 25 last year.
‘It’s more about the quality of chances we feed the centre-forward, it’s much more to do with how we play, the quality of in-possession work, the quality of our final-third work, and what we create for the forward.
‘There are plenty of opportunities to create for a forward. If you look at the chance we had in the 92nd minute at Burnley (Josh Murphy’s cross), there are chances there for centre-forwards being in the six-yard box to put the ball into the back of the net.
‘Centre-forwards also have to make their own luck, they need to hold the ball up and bring everybody else into play, they've got to feed the wide players.
‘With the wide players, it’s not just about them getting one-on-one with their full-backs, we need overlapping full-backs to try to create overloads, we need full-backs to deliver the ball into the box with real quality.
‘We need to break with pace and quality to create these chances - it's a combination of everything.’
Milovanovic - with two of his three goals coming from the penalty spot - is presently joint-top scorer with Adrian Segecic.
Segecic was Pompey’s leading scorer last term with 11, consisting of a hat-trick at Stoke in the penultimate match of the campaign.
Currently, Ebou Adams, Terry Devlin and Zak Swanson each have two this term, reflecting the necessity to increase the goal output from several attacking areas if the Blues are to maintain their heartening progress.
‘I’ve not been concerned this season with the ability to score’
Mousinho added: ‘The overall performance levels have to be better, we must take care of the ball from the back to the front with a lot more efficiency. For the most part, I’ve not been concerned this season with the ability to score.
‘We’ve scored enough goals to put ourselves in a decent position. I do think we also have players who are close to firing and close to getting going. Once we get that across the front line, we’ll be absolutely fine.
‘It’s just a bit of confidence here, a bit of confidence there, the ball hitting the back of the net once or twice for a couple.’