Brighton Carabao Cup humbling doesn't have to damage Portsmouth's season

Tom Naylor believes Pompey’s Carabao Cup thumping at Brighton doesn’t have to be damaging for their season.
Tom NaylorTom Naylor
Tom Naylor

The Blues were soundly beaten 4-0 by their south coast neighbours, who put Kenny Jackett’s side to the sword in the second half.

Pompey held out for 38 minutes before the opener arrived through Alexis MacAllister and had moments of threat themselves as they racked up eight corners.

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But two goals in three minutes after the restart turned the face of the game with the Seagulls adding a fourth with 19 minutes remaining.

Few would’ve expected Pompey to progress, as Graham Potter made 11 changes and could still afford to field players of the quality of £17m record signing Alireza Jahanbakhsh and German midfielder Pascal Gross.

So Naylor feels there’s no need for the game’s outcome to knock confidence as the focus turns to league action at Rochdale on Sunday.

He said: ‘Their strengths are massive whatever squad they put out.

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‘I thought the scoreline didn’t reflect our performance really.

‘I thought we played well in the first half, but a few errors cost us with the goals.

‘I thought we passed it quite well for a lot of a game.

‘But once they got the second goal their tails were up and we switched off at times.

‘It’s a cup game but there are things we should take heart from.

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‘But they are a stronger team than us and I guess that showed in the second half really.

‘I think we have to keep our heads up though and go again on Sunday.’

Pompey always knew Brighton were likely to dominate possession going into the game - and so it proved on the Amex Stadium’s wide open spaces.

But Naylor felt the manner in which his team restricted the Seagulls’ space was positive to take moving forward.

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He added: ‘We knew it was going to be possession game for them, and that was something we said before the match.‘I don’t think they really played through us at all in the first half.’

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