'Cautious' Portsmouth boss' injury admission over talented Bristol City loanee

The Bristol City loanee is in the frame for his full debut at Wycombe in the FA Cup on Friday night (7.45pm) as the Blues rotate their side.

With Marlon Pack serving a one-match ban and Conor Shaughnessy, Regan Poole and Ibane Bowat still injured, central defensive options are at a premium anyway.

Nonetheless, a start in the Adams Park clash would represent another landmark in Atkinson’s injury comeback after almost two years without featuring in first-team line-up.

Although Mousinho acknowledges the highly-regarded 26-year-old must be handled with care during these early stages of his competitive playing return.

He told The News: ‘Am I concerned about his injuries? Concern isn’t the right word, we are wary of it, so we want to manage him and we want to make sure we put him in the right place.

‘We’ve signed players that have never been injured before in their careers, only to then be out for significant periods with injuries they have sustained while playing for us.

‘It happens, it just happens, there's not a huge amount we can do about it. The most important thing is awareness of Rob’s injury history, making sure we manage him properly.

‘From Sunderland, that is 10 days until our next league game where we can control everything we do on the training pitch, control his minutes against Wycombe on Friday, and I think that puts us in a good spot.

‘If you look at the Saturday to Saturday games, Rob can play those. We will have to take a view on midweek to Saturday matches, though.

‘He’s not played football for two years, so we have to be careful.’

Atkinson has made an instant impact at Pompey following his arrival on loan for the remainder of the season.

Just 48 hours after joining, he came off the bench at Sunderland in the 67th minute following Pack’s dismissal, partnering Ryley Towler in the centre of defence in the 1-0 defeat.

The former Eastleigh man turned in a strong performance in what was his maiden first-team match since February 2023 - when he tore his ACL at the Stadium of Light.

Mousinho added: ‘If we had taken a centre-half that hadn’t played a huge amount of minutes this season we would be careful anyway.

‘We have taken a centre-half who has been fit and played in under-21s games, but hasn’t played first-team football for a couple of years. Sunderland was his first since February 2023.

‘So we just have to be cautious with that.’