'We're never going to be bullied by players': Portsmouth boss speaks out over wantaway Callum Lang's Preston North End move
The attacker moved to Deepdale on transfer deadline day after two years on the south coast
John Mousinho has confirmed Callum Lang put in a transfer request to drive his Fratton Park exit.
And he believes had the 27-year-old remained a Pompey player rather than being allowed to join Preston North End, he wouldn’t have been ‘wholeheartedly in it’.
Speaking ahead of the Blues’ trip to Deepdale, when Lang could face his former club for his Lilywhites debut, Mousinho made it categorically clear he was absolutely in favour of the deadline day departure.
Chief executive Andy Cullen had previously claimed it was ‘good business’ to sell the attacker to Preston for what was their club-record transfer.
That view was echoed by Mousinho, albeit largely from a football perspective when faced with losing one of his leading Pompey players.
And the Blues’ head coach is adamant that not standing in the way of the unsettled Lang was the correct decision.
‘I wasn’t convinced he was going to be wholeheartedly in it’
Mousinho told The News: ‘I was consulted throughout when the possibility of Callum leaving came up. The conversation was not around what the club wanted, it was around what the team’s needs were.
‘Ultimately, when the two things combined and we had the correct valuation, in my opinion, weighing up everything I knew about the situation, I thought it was the right thing to do.
‘The money makes no difference, it’s not like the club needed the money to spend or needed the money to go out and do something else. We had everything in January budgeted for anyway, in terms of what we wanted to do, in terms of the incomings.
‘But the situation which arose was I had to make the decision and the call of whether we wanted to maximise the value of the assets we had at the football club - versus keeping a player around for the next three months who I wasn’t convinced was going to be wholeheartedly in it anyway.
‘He wasn’t unhappy until very late in the window. I wasn’t aware of the transfer request when I spoke to you guys on Monday, that came late in the window.
‘It was really clear the player wanted to leave and, when a player makes it clear that they want to leave, as long as we are content with the situation, we are never going to be bullied by players digging their heels in.
‘If a player does want to go and the valuation is met, which was over and above what we originally had for Callum, then we made the decision at that point that it was probably the right thing to do.
‘If I said I wanted to keep the player, the club would have said that’s absolutely fine and we move on. But I made that call at that time.’
11 Pompey appearances in 12 months
Another factor in Mousinho’s decision was Lang’s availability record, having featured just 11 times in the last 12 months due to persistent hamstring injuries.
Indeed, he had managed just eight matches this season, although was pencilled in to return against Ipswich had he remained a Pompey player.
Lang could well feature for Preston on Saturday - ironically against the club he left just five days earlier.
Mousinho added: ‘Callum’s injury record came up, he always plays at full tilt and he picked up a few injuries in the last 12 months, so that definitely came into our thinking.
‘The greatest predictor of future hamstring injuries is what has happened in the past? You can try to break down things as much as you want, but if you’ve had a chequered history of hamstring injuries - and we’ve got a couple in the building at the moment - the past is a good indicator of what might happen in the future.
‘I am not saying that would happen and we will obviously see, but that did come into consideration.’