Portsmouth boss’ damning response over summer transfers yet to make mark in Championship
The summer transfer business has been under the spotlight, with Pompey boss John Mousinho delivering a no-nonsense response to the new signings’ Championship impact so far.
John Mousinho admitted none of Pompey’s summer signings have consistently performed yet at Championship level.
But the Blues boss underlined it’s still a very formative stage of their Fratton careers, for the 11 new faces who arrived in the last transfer window.
Mousinho pulled no punches, as he stated those players arriving in the summer have yet to show themselves to be ‘good enough’ to be involved in the starting XI every week.
And he underlined the fact he sees all of the starting places in his team being up for grabs at present as revealing, when it comes to showing the levels reached by new additions at this stage.
It was a busy summer of activity to prepare for the second Championship campaign, with Adrian Segecic the first player through the door on June 18 and excitement greeting Conor Chaplin’s loan capture at the window’s climax.
To date, Segecic has been the clearest success with four goals putting him at the head of Pompey’s goal charts, while Josef Bursik has strengthened the goalkeeper department.
Of the rest, there’s been no clear successes at this stage, with over a third of the season played. Mousinho acknowledged that was the case, while making it clear it’s still early days for new recruits.
The Pompey boss said: ‘People are going to form opinions early on about players, that’s fine we expect that.
‘I still think it’s very, very early in their Portsmouth careers, and some were signed for the long term anyway.
‘There are some who’ve done well in glimpses and some who’ve done well in more consistent patches of form, but there’s probably no one who’s taken the ball by the horns and said they’re ready, fit and good enough to play every, single one of those games we’ve played so far this season.
‘I don’t think anyone has actually managed to do that, apart from Regan Poole and Andre Dozzell, who aren’t new signings.
Pompey boss: ‘Every space up for grabs - tells you what need to know’
‘I think every space in the side is probably up for grabs at the moment, which probably tells you what you need to know.’
One criticism of Pompey’s most recent transfer business is there aren’t enough players who are making a big impact at this stage of their Fratton stays.
There was clearly an eye on the future with some additions such as Franco Umeh and Mackenzie Kirk, with Luke Le Roux and Mark Kosznovszky in the same category to a degree.
Meanwhile, Chaplin, John Swift and Josh Knight were recruited with their Championship experience designed to impact the here and now. Mousinho underlined the short term wasn’t overlooked when it came to the most recent signings, despite Pompey struggling at Championship level of late.
He added: ‘We tried to do that in the summer (sign for the here and now). We want that longer-term focus at the football club, but we did sign John Swift and we did sign Conor Chaplin.
‘We didn’t sign a complete raft of kids and hope that would be the answer, so we’re fully aware of trying to get players in for the level as well.’