Pompey boss pledges to resolve defensive issues

The Blues have now gone 12 matches without a clean sheet as their awful 2018 continues.

On Saturday they slumped to a 3-1 defeat at Southend, failing to recover having fallen two goals behind in the opening 12 minutes.

Their last shut-out was on December 16 in the 1-0 home victory over Bury.

Since then they have conceded 19 goals in 12 fixtures in all competitions.

And Jackett is desperate to rediscover the defensive solidity which yielded four successive clean sheets between November and December.

He said: ‘We were getting clean sheets in November and December, but that doesn’t count today.

‘We are in February now and that doesn’t count for anything.

‘One-off situations can happen, but we have made too many mistakes. There have been too many goals against and we have gone too many games without clean sheets.

‘Your goals against column have to be zeros and ones to have any chance of getting points, then ultimately build confidence in players.

‘It is down to a little bit of individual form and decisions, but collectively we have to take responsibility to get better.

‘All I am interested in now is us improving on that in the future – and we will.

‘I’ve felt all the way through January and February we’ve looked brittle at the back, we’ve conceded too many goals, we haven’t got any clean sheets, unlike through November and December.

‘At times you are going to be under pressure, but it doesn’t need much pressure at the moment to score against us.

‘It’s something which needs to improve if we are going to build on form in the second half of the season.’

Matt Clarke’s own goal gifted a sixth-minute lead to Southend.

That was doubled on 12 minutes by Jason Demetriou’s strike from outside the box following Stephen McLaughlin’s pass.

Gareth Evans pulled one back, but Demetriou wrapped up victory with his second arriving on 84 minutes.

Jackett added: ‘We had to be able to go to Southend and sustain some pressure, but it wasn’t the case.

‘We started well and were aggressive and probably had the first chance of the game, but two poor goals against sums us up because, in my opinion, we’ve looked brittle at the back and need to be stronger.

‘The big chance in the second half was (Shayon) Harrison’s header on the far post, we are so easy to get in down that side where the left-back (Ben) Coker has clipped it down.

‘We are not putting in a challenge, we are not blocking crosses, we are not anticipating and reading things first, we are not stepping in front of people. We are being very, very passive.

‘Okay, Harrison missed that, but it summed up our defensive display.’