Portsmouth boss addresses out-of-favour ex-Sunderland man's Fratton future after shock Blues return

Although the head coach admits the left-back’s Pompey future remains up in the air with the January transfer window on the horizon.

With Connor Ogilvie injured and Jack Sparkes rested, Hume returned to the Blues’ side for Tuesday night’s trip to Leyton Orient in the Bristol Street Motors Trophy.

The former Sunderland man hadn’t been included in a Pompey squad at any level since being an unused substitute in a July friendly at the Hawks.

Yet he turned in a battling display as John Mousinho’s 10 men pulled off a gutsy 2-1 victory to progress in the competition.

The head coach told The News: ‘If you haven't played football at a competitive level for such a long time – and his last game was Morecambe in April – it takes you a bit of time, especially with Theo Archibald in their side, who is a real stalwart of their league side and a good player.

‘He settled into the game really well and had a hell of a job to do. Sometimes it was 2v1 and he had to stop crosses and get out to the ball and did it really well.

‘The situation at the football club at the moment isn’t ideal for him, we’ve made no bones about that, but he gets his head down and trains hard. When we’ve a session on match-days, he comes in with lads that aren’t in the squad, he does his running, he’s right up there, and has a really good attitude towards everything that he does.

‘That’s what we saw on Tuesday night because, no matter what happens with Denver at the football club going forward, he has shown he can compete, he has shown he is capable of coming in at very short notice and fair play to him.

‘We knew Denver wanted to leave in the summer and are absolutely fine with that. We had a grown-up conversation about it, but couldn't make it happen in the transfer window.

‘Who knows if he will leave in January. We obviously still have two left-backs in the building and I think Denver will have aspirations to play a lot more minutes.

‘But this is a key part of our season, you never know what’s around the corner and if Denver hadn't kept his head down and done his work, we wouldn't have put him into the side, it wouldn’t have been beneficial to him.’

Despite being out of favour and effectively up for sale, Hume has continued to train regularly with the Blues.

And Mousinho has refused to exile the full-back despite doubts over his Fratton Park future.

He added: ‘I am very young in my head coaching career, you never know what’s around the corner, but we want to treat people properly if we can.

‘Sometimes numbers don’t work out in training and players aren’t involved, but we always keep them around the first-team as much as possible.

‘Denver travelled on Sunday (to Chesterfield), we knew he probably wasn’t going to be in the squad but wanted to integrate him into the side, get him used to it, because we knew he was in with a chance of playing on Tuesday,

‘He’s a popular character among the lads and, no matter what happens with Denver, he has put a lot of credit in the bank.’