Portsmouth boss' player confidence admission as Blues bounce back with 'brilliant' victory

John Mousinho hailed a ‘brilliant’ Pompey result after overcoming their concerning blip.

By the head coach’s own admission, a run of three matches without victory had dented player confidence, while the gruelling festive fixture list left them looking ‘tired’.

The fact the latest challenge was against a high-flying Stevenage side who had previously lost once in 15 matches in all competitions was also daunting.

Nonetheless, Paddy Lane and Colby Bishop were the scorers as the Blues secured a 2-1 triumph over the visitors on New Year’s Day.

A welcome lift for Mousinho and the players following two points from nine available - and he was understandably delighted.

The head coach told The News: ‘I think it answered a few questions. You have to get used to winning games, that's the most important thing.

‘Performances are really important to us as well, but it’s towards the back end of the season now and, let’s be honest, we need to get results.

‘There are things we’re going to have to address with the second-half performance. We want to try to win games a bit more comfortably, putting our chances away and not inviting as much pressure as we did.

‘We definitely looked tired in the second half and looked like a side slightly low on confidence off the back of the run. They have travelled a couple of times over the Christmas period, we have to be better at dealing with that.

‘So that result was brilliant. If you had offered me that before the game I would have taken it. There were times in the first half I thought this might be the one where we really put a side to bed, I thought we looked like a decent football side.

‘But these are really tough games, there’s not a lot of ball in play, the game’s quite slow, it’s really physical, when the ball drops sometimes the temptation is just to hook it on and relieve the pressure on our goal.

‘When you play a tough game you take all of those things into account. It is a fantastic, fantastic result because it has been a tough little spell for us.’

Pompey were impressive at times during a first-half in which they led 2-1 at the interval - while in the second period they had to dig in and battle.

Still, it demonstrated both sides of their game as the Blues maintained a two-point lead at the top of League One.

Mousinho added: ‘I was pretty pleased at half-time with how we performed, I thought we played really good stuff. We dealt with the conditions, we dealt with Stevenage’s press and created opportunities.

‘But in the second half on the ball we were poor, I thought we made some poor decisions and never really sustained any pressure in Stevenage’s half.

‘We had to show a different side to the first half, which was really pleasing, especially off the back of everything we’ve dealt with over the last four games and not being in sparkling form.’