Portsmouth boss’ chilling relegation warning as Derby County close gap in Championship survival fight with Cardiff, Stoke City & Co

The Blues boss warned his side are still a long way from being safe in the second tier this season, as Derby County cut down the gap to the drop zone to five points last night.

The Rams climbed out of bottom three as they picked up their fourth win on the spin against Preston, dumping Cardiff into the bottom three in the process.

Pompey’s win over Blackburn last week lifted spirits at PO4 with Mousinho’s side now embarking on three games in eight days, starting with Saturday’s trip to Millwall.

The Blues head coach knows there’s more twists and turns to come in the survival fight yet, as he assessed his side’s relegation rivals.

Mousinho said: ‘There’s a lot of positivity at the football club at the minute, that’s great.

‘But, and I’m not just saying thus, we are so far from being out of the relegation battle.

‘We have to be very wary, sides’ down the bottom will win; we saw that at the weekend, and we saw that when Plymouth came to us and took points.

‘Luton have put together a good run, draw at Middlesbrough and win at Hull; all of a sudden they are back in it.

‘Derby win four on the spin, Stoke win two out of three, Cardiff are dangerous and Oxford are capable of putting together a good run.

‘All of the sides down the bottom are going to win games at this stage of the season: I guarantee you they will win games.

‘Because they will win games, we have to win games and make it about us. We have to focus on ourselves, because that’s all that matters.’

Mousinho watched Derby defeat Preston last night, as they eked out the victory with two quickfire goals after the restart.

Join Neil Allen and Jordan Cross every week for an in-depth read on the Blues with our new premium newsletter Pompey Talk - here’s where to sign up

The Pompey boss isn’t hiding from the fact eyes will be on the results around his side throughout the run-in, but he underlined where the focus must lie.

Mousinho said: ‘These games affect us, so everyone will be looking at the results and watching the games.

‘We’ll definitely keep an eye on them, this time of season in particular the league table doesn’t lie and the games in and around affect us.

‘On the flipside, though, it has to be much more prevalent that we focus 99 per cent of our attention on ourselves.

Pompey boss: ‘It’s about us’.

‘That’s the most important thing, but we do look at other results.

‘In the Championship it’s very different to League One, because 98 per cent of the time when you kick off at 3pm in League One there will be 11 fixtures kicking off at the same time after one on Friday night.

‘Sometimes this year there’s maybe been more pressure, because sides have won early on or Friday or the opposite way around. So you have to work really hard not to get bogged down in any of that.

‘By the time we play Coventry, we have to work really hard not to get bogged down in any result which happens on Tuesday night.

‘It’s about us and what we do - that has to be the focus.

‘It’s impossible to do it 100 per cent because you have an eye on other fixtures and results, but you have to do your best to try to ignore it.’

YOUR NEXT POMPEY READ: Former Pompey defender JAILED as Premier League man sent down for fraud.