Kenny Jackett: Up to nine Portsmouth wins needed out of final 10 games to overhaul Luton and Barnsley

That is the daunting figure the Blues boss has put on gatecrashing those presently inhabiting the top two –  Luton and Barnsley.

Pompey slipped to a hugely disappointing 2-1 defeat at Charlton in tonight’s televised encounter.

In truth, the visitors warranted little from their trip to The Valley, with Ronan Curtis’ 12th goal of the season all they had to show.

With 10 games remaining, Jackett’s men are now eight points adrift of second spot – and 11 short of top.

And he believes only an exceptional run can now see Pompey break into such positions.

The Blues boss said: ‘We are going to need a real sprint finish, eight or nine wins out of 10.

‘You can do that, we are capable of doing that as well, and Portsmouth can get that momentum going.

‘But we are going to need that type of run to get to the top two and put the pressure on them.

‘If we don’t quite get to that, we want to be qualifying for the play-offs with 10 games to go, and we are certainly not there yet. We want to be performing well and playing well.

‘We have some good players and are capable of finishing the season strongly, doing everything we can to try to get one of those three promotion places.

‘Today some key moments either didn’t go our way or we didn’t do well enough or didn’t finish well enough.

‘I thought overall Charlton are very, very strong in midfield, have some very good technical players and, at times, we didn't get to grips with that.

‘Overall, we have to learn, we have to learn all of the time.’