Hurst: Shrewsbury will relish Pompey battle

The Shrews boss is expecting a difficult clash when his side visit Pompey tomorrow (3pm) but aims to keep the Fratton faithful quiet.

The Blues have collected 29 points at PO4 this season and haven’t lost on their own patch for almost three months.

High-flying Shrewsbury defeated Kenny Jackett’s side in the reverse fixture last month.

Hurst believes his outfit can return to New Meadow with a result if they deliver a similar performance to that 2-0 success before Christmas.

And he feels the Shrews will thrive on the atmosphere at Fratton Park.

‘It’s another long journey for the players and we know they’ve got a good home record,’ Hurst told the Shropshire Star.

‘There’ll be a big crowd in, a very vocal crowd. It’s a good place to play football, a real hotbed of football.

‘It will be a difficult one, we know that.

‘It wasn’t that long ago that we played them.

‘We had a good victory and we’ll be delighted if we can go there and put on a similar performance that would at least give us a chance of getting that result.

‘It’s one of the fixtures you look forward to and maybe look at and think “I’m looking forward to going there”.

‘It doesn’t seem that long ago to myself, but they’re a former Premier League side.

‘The club’s been through some difficult times, but I think is now on the way up again – hopefully not at our expense at the weekend.

‘But it’s one the players should really enjoy and hopefully we can keep the big crowd as quiet as possible.’