'It just shows panic' - Portsmouth advised not to change tactics for trip to Burnley amid winless start to Championship

That’s the verdict of The News’ chief sports writer, Neil Allen, who believes any system switch this early into the new season could be seen as an act of desperation by the head coach.

The Blues head to Burnley on Saturday with just three points from their opening five games of the campaign. That leaves them second from bottom in the table and one of only three teams yet to pick up a victory this term.

There’s mitigating factors at the centre of that, of course, including the tough stretch of opening fixtures that greeted Pompey on their Championship return. Injuries have also played their part, particularly in defence, with Mousinho often having just one fit centre-back to choose from for the majority of games played to date.

That has contributed to the Blues leaking 11 goals so far, which is the joint-worst in the division and only marginally better than the goals conceded by Carlisle, Accrington (both 14), Grimsby and Blackpool (both 12) in the EFL.

Last week’s return of centre-back duo Regan Poole and Tom McIntyre will alleviate some of the problems Pompey have been experiencing in their defensive ranks. Meanwhile, Conor Shaughnessy is also believed to be nearing his return after a recent calf issue.

According to Allen, though, utilising all three from the start in a new-look 3-5-2 formation to stem the flow of goals being conceded could be considered a ‘panic’ response to the Blues’ early-season issues.

Speaking in the latest episode of Pompey Tak - which is available on Freeview channel 262 - Allen said: ‘I always think, when managers start changing shape early in the season, it just shows panic, really!

‘His (Mousinho) favoured system is 4-2-3-2 or 4-3-3, whatever way you want to put it, that’s his system. He doesn’t like playing a back three. He played it a couple of times, I think, but this is his system. This is how they trained all pre-season, this is what they recruited the players for, so this is it.

‘I can’t see him changing it unless he changes it through desperation in the end.

‘Let’s not forget that Pompey, until the last game, had just one fit centre-half. So I can’t see them suddenly thinking: “now we’ve got more than one fit centre-half, let’s play three of them”. 

‘So I can’t see it at the moment. It may happen in the future as the team are struggling to win games, that’s a fact. But at the moment he’s got players that fit into his favoured system.

‘Also, where do you fit Josh Murphy into a wing-back system? Where’s he play? Do you play two centre-forwards as well? Well, they’re struggling to do that as well at the moment.

‘It’s a difficult call at the moment to do that.’