Bullish Portsmouth boss John Mousinho still targeting Bolton and Derby despite Port Vale set-back

In a below-par performance, the Blues fought back from 2-0 deficit to claim a 2-2 draw against Darrell Clarke’s visitors.

Nonetheless, it represented a frustrating result, effectively two points dropped at Fratton Park during the late charge for a top-six place.

It leaves Pompey six points off fifth-placed Bolton and behind them Derby with eight matches remaining – having played the same amount of games.

But Mousinho shrugged off the blow, with focus on promotion unwavering.

He told The News: ‘The play-offs are very much still alive, I‘m sure of that.

‘I think if we’d had a conversation back in January and said “After that Port Vale game you will be six points off the top-six”, I am guessing we would probably have said it’s something we can fight for with eight games to go in the season.

‘Four of those eight are at home, plenty to play for, that’s a six-point gap with eight matches to play.

‘We’re going to have to play a lot better than that, we know that, but it’s definitely still there.

‘The point does a couple of things. First of all it’s a point, we need to keep chalking those off, and also the momentum, the fact we have not lost, the fact we didn’t let Port Vale dictate the tempo like we did the first half.

‘In the second half we didn’t make the mistakes we previously made and got back in the game, that should give the lads a huge amount of confidence that they’re able to do that.

‘With everything – not just 2-0 down at half-time having missed a penalty – when you come into these games there’s that massive rate of expectation from the home fans, quite rightly.

‘That weight of expectation doubles when you’re not playing particularly well and some of the things we did in the first half weren't great to watch.

‘So it’s really, really pleasing to show that resilience and strength of character to come back into the game.’

Mousinho had chosen Owen Dale to replace Joe Morrell during his absence on international duty with Wales.

Yet it was the introduction of Michael Jacobs from the bench for the injured Paddy Lane which proved crucial, grabbing the 70th-minute equaliser.

The head coach added: ‘We wanted to get Owen in behind Colby with the way Port Vale play being really aggressive.

‘The idea was we could stretch them quite early on with someone running off Colby from deep and – a couple of times in the first half – it worked well.

‘‘Michael did really well when he came on and he’s one of those that has been a bit unlucky to not start a few of the last games considering his form and his quality.’