John Mousinho allays fresh Ibane Bowat injury fears - and pinpoints long-awaited Portsmouth return

John Mousinho has pinpointed Ibane Bowat’s return date after the defender experienced discomfort during his injury comeback.

But the Blues boss is adamant there is nothing to be concerned about as the former Fulham man nears his long-awaited first-team bow.

The 22-year-old isn’t presently training with the Blues squad having been sidelined since September 2024 after suffering patellar tendon damage to his knee.

Instead, on Wednesday he worked with first-team fitness coach Max Whittingham away from his team-mates at Pompey’s Hilsea training ground, mainly focusing on running.

Regardless, Bowat will be part of the 25-man squad travelling to Slovakia on Saturday for a seven-day training camp near Bratislava.

And Mousinho expects the highly-regarded central defender to return to full training during their stay.

‘Very close’

The Blues’ head coach told The News: ‘Ibane is very close to being back. He’s had a couple of things with the knee, not set-backs, but just feeling a bit of pain here and there.

‘So we’ve been cautious with him because he has been out for the best part of 11 months now. We just want to make sure the patella itself is absolutely fine.

‘Wherever you come back from those long-term injuries, sometimes it’s other bits which you start to feel, as we have seen with a couple of the other lads.

‘Ibane has been involved with us for most of the pre-season work, we’re just taking the load off a bit now before bringing him back, but he is very close to full training.

‘I suspect he will train fully when we are in Slovakia and hopefully we will see him in friendlies.’

Loan spells in Holland and Austria

Bowat has previously spent loan spells with Dutch side Den Bosch and TSV Hartberg from the Austrian Bundesliga.

He also has six international caps for Scotland Under-21s, qualifying through his maternal grandmother, although he is now aged 22 and beyond the age range.

Pompey represented the opportunity to finally play competitively in England at first-team level, having never made an appearance during his time at Craven Cottage.

However, after moving to the south coast in August 2024, Bowat sustained a serious knee injury while shooting in a small-sided game in training, ruling him out for the 2024-25 season.

Portsmouth boss: ‘A left-sided centre-half with a lot of pace’

Mousinho added: ‘Ibane is a player we were really excited about bringing in last year. A left-sided centre-half with a lot of pace, he’s aggressive, a very, very good athlete, and good on the ball as well.

‘One of the bonuses with Ibane is we have him on a permanent after signing him from Fulham, where he had played for their PL2 side.

‘A lot of the time they haven’t had that exposure to being out on loan, but he’s had that twice - and on the continent as well - so he’s a player with a lot of experience as well. That’s really exciting for us.

‘Ibane is still at a very, very young age and has a lot of potential.’

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