Why Portsmouth won’t miss romantic homecomings as they turn away from Brighton and West Brom pair
Pompey are unlikely to pursue deals for Adam Webster and Jed Wallace at this stage as the transfer window opens. We explore the factors behind that decision and why, hopefully, that’s no bad thing.
It’s a notion drenched in emotion and laden with memories of past glories.
So there’s no wonder the idea of a transfer homecoming for former players is a concept which appeals to many Pompey supporters.
No homecoming for Wallace and Webster at this stage - and why that’s the case
Invariably fans are swayed by memories of players in their pomp at Fratton Park, believing those halcyon days can be reclaimed no matter how many years have passed.
Then there’s that well-worn adage an old hero ‘gets the club’, something you will regularly hear as a selling point to justify recruiting a player for a second Fratton stint.
In the case of the most successful PO4 homecoming in recent years, that is undeniably the case.
Marlon Pack’s Fratton return is now headed into a fifth season, in which the Buckland boy has lifted the League One title and helped reestablish his club in the Championship as a standard bearer on that journey.
Pompey leaned on the midfielder’s emotional attachment in 2022, as Pack passed up more lucrative options to return to his city with his family.
But for every Pack there is a Benjani, Paul Walsh and sadly Conor Chaplin who for differing reasons, had second spells which just didn't work out.
In Chaplin’s case the circumstances were slightly different, as he perhaps found himself at odds with a brand of football a distance from how he’d been operating for five years at Ipswich.
Often, however, it's time’s erosion of the assets that made former favourites so popular which lessens the impact of a return - especially when injuries have taken their toll on performance.
Which leads us to this summer’s transfer window and a couple of names we can cross off Pompey’s transfer hit-list - at this stage.
Jed Wallace and Adam Webster are both looking for new clubs and will not be short of suitors in the months ahead.
The club’s football operation are travelling a different path, however, as they look to different options in terms of age and profile.
That’s not to say both men don’t still have much to offer - they certainly do - but Pompey are clearly traversing another course.
Two years ago, the notion of signing Matt Ritchie was emphatically dismissed, before the club opted to move for the Gosport lad in August as he left Newcastle.
Likewise last year, everything was very quiet on John Swift until things moved very quickly in the middle of July.
You can speculate on why the picture changed on both players, perhaps becoming deals which made sense as alternatives fell by the wayside.
For that reason picking up the trail on both former players isn’t out of the question, but the hope and expectation has to be Pompey becoming a more established Championship side with increased spending power will open the door to the kind of recruits previously closed.
It seems the requirement out wide is for electric pace and physicality over the kind of guile and hard running Wallace offers.
And while Webster would be at the head of Pompey’s existing centre-back roster, it’s a department the club already need to trim with six options to call upon.
It’s for those factors further emotional homecomings don’t appear to be on the cards this summer and, when weighing up the factors why, perhaps that’s no bad thing this time.