Portsmouth prospect urged to 'keep plugging away' after yet another devastating set-back
The attacker made his Pompey debut against Wycombe in January 2025 in an FA Cup fixture
Harry Clout has been urged to ‘keep plugged away’ after his latest loan set-back.
Surprisingly, the 19-year-old featured for Pompey’s Academy in Tuesday night’s 3-1 victory over the Hawks in the Portsmouth Senior Cup.
The highly-regarded attacker had previously joined Aaron Martin’s team in December on an initial 28-day loan in a bid for regular match minutes to develop - yet never made an appearance and is now back at Fratton Park.
Clout, who signed his first professional deal in July 2025 and has one Pompey appearance, has also suffered frustrating loan spells at Farnborough and Welling this season, totalling just 12 outings.
And the quarter-final clash at Westleigh Park on Tuesday evening represented a rare playing opportunity, featuring for 72 minutes in the number 10 role for Sam Hudson’s under-18s.
‘Hopefully he can keep improving’
Academy lead professional development phase coach Hudson told The News: ‘Tuesday night was just minutes for Harry. It’s obviously an age-restricted game and, with the 18s having a few injuries and you have to be 16 to play, it was a good chance for Harry to get some match minutes as well.
‘He did what I would probably expect from him, carried the ball well, nice combinations and found some good pickets.
‘It was 4-3-3, with Fraser (Thomas) as the base and Chinedu (Agu) and Harry as the two more attacking ones. With them being so fluid, the strength of that is it’s quite hard to mark and unpredictable, but the weakness is you lose a bit of structure at times.
‘Harry has played a lot as a 10 before, then we had him on the wing a bit with us because he can play inside left as well as wide left, rotating between the two, that inside channel and wide areas. So it’s not too dissimilar.
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‘I don’t know too much about his situation, I don’t see him anymore, but he’s had lots of loans. It’s par for the course with loans, some go well, some don’t and you’ve just got to keep plugging away and fighting at that level. Hopefully he can keep improving.
‘From speaking to people at Havant, they were on a strong winning streak when he was there and it’s always difficult to come in from the outside into a team like that. That’s always going to be a challenge, sometimes you need a bit of luck.’
Ciaran Martin opened the scoring for the Blues on 62 minutes with a first-time left-footed shot from the edge of the box after the Hawks had failed to clear a corner.
The versatile defender spent a successful loan spell with Moneyfields earlier in the season, before he was recalled in November amid a left-back crisis for John Mousinho’s first-team.
And Hudson admitted the second-year scholar will now be considered for another loan spell away from Fratton Park during the remainder of the campaign.
‘He’s a very clever boy and understands the game really well’
He added: ‘You always know what you’re going to get from Ciaran, he’s really calm on the ball, patient with it, and showed a nice range of passing.
‘His experience with Moneyfields on loan shows the understanding of playing against men, when to go tight, when to drop off, he’s a very clever boy and understands the game really well.
‘He doesn't look rattled, which is always nice as a defender. No matter when the ball’s being lumped at you, big boys throwing themselves at you and you are getting pressed, he generally stays quite calm.
‘Potentially, he now goes out on loan again. With the window shut, we’ll look at individual players for loans - and certainly for the second years - in the next few weeks.’