'I still feel like a rookie!': Grateful John Mousinho reflects on his special Portsmouth landmark
Since his January 2023 appointment, Mousinho has overseen 61 wins in 150 Pompey games
John Mousinho reflected on a notable Pompey managerial landmark and admitted: I still feel like a rookie!
Sunday’s FA Cup visit of Arsenal represented the 39-year-old’s 150th match in charge of the Blues following his January 2023 appointment.
At the time, it represented a shock choice by chairman Michael Eisner and his board, with Mousinho having previously been at Oxford United, where he combined playing duties with the role of set-piece coach.
Nonetheless, with sporting director Rich Hughes championing the central defender for his first managerial job, he was unveiled as head coach at Fratton Park - and immediately challenged with keeping 15th-placed Pompey in League One.
Now, 150 games later, only Kenny Jackett has overseen more Blues games in a single spell over the last 30 years.
‘It has been an incredible time’
Mousinho told The News: ‘I know it’s a cliche, but every game in charge at any football club, especially this football club, is a real privilege.
‘I’m in an extremely fortunate position to be able to have coached 150 games at this level for Pompey, I don't think it’s anything I would have ever anticipated.
‘I came here almost three years ago, just trying to make sure we stayed in League One as a first priority - and then built from that. It has been an incredible time.
‘It has flown by in a lot of ways, but also you have to look at how far we are down the road from where we were three years ago. It’s a bit of an oxymoron, it has flown by but also seems like an absolute age.
‘In a lot of ways, it feels like I’m still a rookie in the job. I still feel very, very fresh, yet there are times I’ve experienced it all, mainly because of what we have done over the past few years.
‘We’ve had the mid-table nothing season, we’ve had the promotion charge, we've had the relegation battle, we’ve pretty much had all three - and we’ve got another relegation battle this year and everything in between.
‘I’ve picked up a lot of experience along the way. You never feel you stop learning or stop picking things up. I’m definitely a bit longer in the tooth than when I arrived three years ago.
‘It has been a really brilliant time overall and, hopefully, we can keep going to have a few more matches.’
A managerial debut victory over Exeter
It represented a first League One win in three months for the Blues as the transformation under the former Brentford man impressively gathered pace.
Pompey were crowned League One champions in April 2024, following a memorable 3-2 success over Barnsley, and last season secured Championship status with two games to spare.
Currently they are one place and one point above the relegation zone, albeit with two games in hand on some of their rivals.
And with 61 victories as Pompey boss across two divisions, consisting of a win ratio of 40.67 per cent, Mousinho is adamant there are plenty more games at the Fratton Park helm to come.
‘The outstanding game really would have to be Barnsley’
He added: ‘My favourite games? There’s the obvious one which was the night we beat Barnsley to win League One. We had some great times last year as well, but the outstanding game really would have to be Barnsley.
‘There was also just securing our survival in the Championship last year, those wins against Norwich and Watford were real highlights as well.
‘Norwich away was good, but we hadn’t quite done it then. So to actually come back home and beat Watford to secure our Championship status with two games to play was a brilliant day, especially considering where we had been that season.
‘You can never relax, whether you’re at the top of the league, whether you’re mid-table, whether you are bottom of the league.
‘Arsenal was probably a really good example of where you've got two managers with completely different priorities, under very, very different pressure for different reasons - and that’s the nature of the game.’
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