Lomana Lualua: I dreamt me and Yakubu would score for Portsmouth - it became Southampton's nightmare

But his remarkable 28-minute cameo surpassed even that premonition as the Blues memorably ran out 4-1 winners.

Last Friday marked the 15th anniversary of the thumping south-coast derby triumph over former boss Harry Redknapp on his Fratton Park return.

Lualua netted twice, while there were also goals for Yakubu and Arjan De Zeeuw, as Pompey helped Southampton on their way towards relegation to the Championship.

And in a 2015 interview for Played Up Pompey, Lualua admitted he had had foreseen his contribution the previous night.

‘It was a victory I dreamt was going to happen, a vision in my sleep the night before,’ he told Played Up Pompey.

‘Normally if I know I am going to play in a match, I kind of visualise an outcome, I imagine myself scoring in different scenarios, it’s how I like to prepare.

‘Sometimes I see things in my sleep, it depends how much stress I’m under and what my mind is focused on during the build-up.

‘The visit of Southampton in April 2005 was massive, a big, big game and I would get the reminder of its importance from people whenever I went into town.

‘Everybody was talking about it, you had no choice but to dream about playing Southampton when the day came around.

‘On that Saturday night before the fixture, I dreamt Pompey would win 2-0 with myself and my friend Yakubu scoring.

‘I wasn’t far wrong, although I never quite visualised leaving the pitch after 28 minutes having scored twice and won a penalty!

‘It was an amazing match, a perfect day and I thank God for giving me the opportunity to be involved in an occasion which is so special to Pompey fans.

‘I will never, ever forget being in that game and it means everything to me knowing I played my part in a 4-1 win against my club’s biggest rivals.

‘Ahead of the fixture, I was actually suffering from a little bit of an injury. I had a problem with my hamstring, but didn’t want to miss that game for anything, especially with Harry Redknapp coming back.

‘During our 4-1 win, I scored two goals in five minutes. The first was a long cross-field ball delivered by Berger from the left, I saw the keeper coming and my main feeling was to try to scare him off to win the ball as I knew he couldn’t touch it outside the box.

‘Luckily it worked, he missed it and I swivelled and put it into the net with a right-foot shot from outside the box and celebrated with a flip!

‘It’s funny because with the second goal on 27 minutes I wasn’t even supposed to be on the pitch because I was injured!

‘When I scored I contemplated doing another flip, but if you look back at the footage you can see the pain in my face, my hamstring was giving me agony.

‘After the first goal I was actually going to go off, but it was decided between us to give it another five minutes to see how it went and carry on playing for a little longer.

‘It was a good second goal as well, Yakubu squared a pass to Steve Stone and Danny Higginbotham slid in with a tackle which resulted in the ball springing loose.

‘I was waiting outside the box and took one touch before curling it home right-footed, via the inside of the post, but there was to be no flip, my body wasn’t going to let me!

‘A minute later I had to come off, my hamstring had gone and that was to be my last appearance of the season, missing the final three matches.

‘I was gutted to come off, I wanted to stay there and carry on playing, I was on a hat-trick, and as I left the pitch I suppose you can say I took the goals with me, the match remaining 4-1 until the final whistle.

‘I still have that Southampton match on DVD and, whenever I need happy memories to cheer me up, I get it out and watch it.

‘That was one of my happiest times in football and I am so grateful to God for letting me be part of such a wonderful occasion.’

Lomana Lualua made 91 Pompey appearances and scored 19 goals from February 2004 until August 2007.

Played Up Pompey Too, released in 2017, is still available from Amazon. While Played Up Pompey Three, which contains more of your favourite Blues players, is out in September.

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