'It's not an ultimatum, not at all': Portsmouth boss sets the record straight on his Fratton Park future
The Blues head coach has been vocal of the need for more ambition at Fratton Park - but denies he could quit over it
John Mousinho is adamant his powerful pleas to Pompey’s owners for greater ambition isn’t an ultimatum.
And the head coach insists he won’t be walking out on the Blues should Tornante opt not to act on his recommendations during meetings scheduled for today and tomorrow.
Having secured Championship survival for successive seasons, Mousinho is eager to be provided the finances to mold Pompey into something other than perennial relegation candidates.
Since the Blues secured their status against Coventry nine days ago, he has spoken eloquently and candidly over the need for the club to match his - and the fans’ - aspirations after two years of consolidation.
Many have perceived that to be a back-me-or-I-quit threat to chairman Michael Eisner, with Bristol City linked with the 40-year-old’s services.
But Mousinho explains he’s speaking up purely for the good of the club - and his own desire to achieve more success on the south coast.
‘It’s not an ultimatum, not at all. I have been very deliberate in what I’ve said.’
He told The News: ‘First of all, I can’t do that (quitting), secondly I don’t want to do it.
‘What you can’t do is quickly forget the opportunity the club gave me, the backing the club have given me over the past three-and-a-half years, the relationship I've got with the owners.
‘I do think it has been important to talk about this over the past couple of weeks, particularly for the fans. The fans should be expecting me to go and demand these things. Like I ask of players, like I ask of staff.
‘Maybe I am wrong on this, but, as an owner, I would want a head coach that wanted the very best for the football club - and that’s all I want.
‘It’s not an ultimatum, not at all. I have been very, very deliberate in what I have said. I don’t think anything I’m saying is controversial, I don't think anything I am saying is particularly provocative, it is let’s have a sit down, let’s talk about a strategy within the football club, let’s talk about ambition, let’s talk about where we want to get to.
‘Tell me what the ambition of the football club is and, between myself and Rich (Hughes), we will give you the best representation of what that looks like underneath and how I think we can achieve it.
‘That’s nonsense’
‘By no means is it an ultimatum. But if I had been quiet over the past couple of weeks and said “What we’re going to do at the end of the season is have meetings with the players and we’ll go off on holiday”. That’s nonsense.
‘I don’t think anybody will want that as a head coach, fans don't want that as a head coach, the owners don’t want that as a head coach either.
‘I can’t just leave. You can always throw out your toys and you can always dig in, I am not that naive, I know that can happen. But it hasn’t even occurred to me to quit because I think we’ll get an understanding and a good response from the ownership.
‘I am not going in and saying we need to spend X, Y and Z, it’s not about that, it’s about matching up how we can improve and how we can shift it into the right direction.
‘If we have ambitions of being a Premier League club, let’s find out when that date is, when we want to do it, and work backwards from there. We need to come up with a plan - and if we don’t want to become a Premier League club, fine. Although a lot of fans would want that eventually.’
During his latest visit to the south coast, meetings are scheduled with Mousinho and sporting director Rich Hughes, with Tornante are expected to detail their vision for Pompey as all now focus on a third consecutive season in the Championship.
Mousinho has praised the ongoing financial backing of the Eisner family, who have invested £54m into the club since taking over from fan ownership in August 2017.
And he believes the club’s infrastructure is now ‘building towards’ other Championship clubs.
‘In order to go to the next level, we have to change something’
Mousinho added: ‘At the minute, my gut feeling from the fans and from speaking to people and being out there is that we want to move on from where we are now. We don’t want to be perennial battlers against relegation.
‘In order to achieve that and go to the next level - and hopefully go to the next level again - we have to change something. I think it’s really important.
‘The potential is there. The history of the football club means we don’t have the infrastructure that other football clubs in the Championship have - and we are building towards that, we are making improvements.
‘We are sitting in this room, you see the improvements in the training ground, you walk through it, every single summer something else is being done, something else is being built, something else is being done at Fratton.
‘We are a bit behind with that, but we’re catching up as quickly as we possibly can from a club which didn’t have a training ground 12 years ago. So we have made huge strides there.
‘There is also the issue of being careful about how we do it. The last thing the club wants is financial issues, there is always a clamour for owners to spend more, but our owners can rightly turn around and say we’ve spent a huge amount of money.
‘There is no doubt the football club is in a really good, solid financial position, everyone gets paid and we are not getting deducted any points. I think that’s a really important point as well.’