Christian Burgess: I refused to give up - Now I'm making my 200th Portsmouth appearance

The central defender’s remarkable re-emergence serves as a story to inspire those who find themselves relegated to fringe status

A year ago Burgess was relying on outings against Spurs under-21s and Arsenal under-21s in the EFL Trophy to provide rare match minutes.

Today he is on the brink of his 200th appearance, having re-established himself as Kenny Jackett’s first-choice centre-half.

Since joining from Peterborough in June 2015, Burgess has won the League Two title, Checkatrade Trophy and reached two play-off semi-finals.

Now, on Saturday against Sunderland, he will become the fourth Pompey player of the 21st Century to register 200 outings.

Burgess said: ‘Definitely there were times I wasn’t too sure if it would come, it has probably come sooner than expected as well.

‘It’s not always going to go your way, football is a game of opinions, you won't always be in favour, you can’t hold that personally on anyone.

‘You must get your head down, work hard, use your time wisely, work on other things when out of the side – and hopefully that chance comes.

‘This time last year I wasn’t involved, football is a funny game. You just have to keep a positive attitude and be ready.

‘I tell the boys who find themselves out of the side to keep working hard, you never know what will happen in football.

‘There’s really no point throwing your hands in the air and throwing your toys out of the pram, it’s about what else can you do, what extra can you do.

‘While you’re not in the team, see it as an opportunity to work on something outside of playing every game.’

Burgess is out of contract this summer, yet keen to remain at Fratton Park.

In the meantime, there are high standards to maintain.

He added: ‘In the summer, there were another few playing ahead of me, but I always believed in myself.

‘It was about trying to get a little bit of consistency to be someone who’s reliable and really hard to drop.’