Portsmouth boss tips ex-Cardiff and Oxford United's man's Fratton Park career for long-awaited lift-off

It was an eye-catching cameo which produced Gavin Whyte’s first Pompey league assist.

Now John Mousinho has backed the moment to ignite the Northern Ireland international’s so far disappointing Blues career.

It has been a frustrating start to Fratton Park life for the former Cardiff man since his summer arrival, failing to score or assist in any of his opening 15 League One appearances.

There was an assist against Gillingham in the Bristol Street Motors Trophy, but otherwise it has been underwhelming from Whyte.

However, after replacing the injured Abu Kamara in the 67th minute against Bolton, he laid on a sublime pass for Kusini Yengi to net from four yards out.

And overall it was an impressive outing from the bench in the league leaders’ 2-0 triumph.

Mousinho told The News: ‘He looked sharp when he came on, it was the Gavin Whyte I know and played with all those years ago. He had an effect on the game.

‘We’ve seen it in training day in, day out and, while I know we haven’t quite seen him do that for Pompey, we’ve seen really good glimpses. He’s a very, very good player, I know that.

‘He’s had plenty going on, it has been a big change for him coming down to Portsmouth, yet that display was the culmination of a lot of things.

‘He’s managed to get a good period of training under his belt, a lot of things are settling down for him, and we should expect to see plenty more from Gavin.

‘There was also that run in the second half, which showed his athleticism, and we’re just starting to see that.

‘It has been an interesting couple of years for Gavin in terms of not necessarily playing a huge amount for Cardiff, but he is loved here. I have a huge amount of faith in him, as do the coaching staff, and he will definitely produce for this football club.’

Whyte’s previous assist in his opening 18 Pompey outings was playing the ball in the path of Ben Stevenson to score with a right-footed shot from outside the box against Gillingham.

His second could not have been more timely, effectively sealing victory over Bolton in the 89th minute.

Mousinho added: ‘As good as we were in the second half, we only showed real glimpses of quality in the final third, we kept breaking on them and didn’t quite get there.

‘Alex Robertson had a couple of opportunities, Marlon maybe should have put his foot through another, Abu when he got tackled for the injury.

‘I do know it’s difficult, but we have the quality, and as soon as Gavin produced that bit of quality, we ended up getting a second goal.’