Former Portsmouth striker seals League One move as Premier League side sanction another loan

Former Pompey striker Mark O’Mahony is heading out on loan again from Brighton.

Fresh from a full Championship season spent at Fratton Park, the Republic of Ireland under-21 international has been granted a second successive year away from the Amex Stadium - only this time to a League One side.

Indeed, after struggling to make a consistent impact with the Blues, who finished 16th in the second tier last term, O’Mahony has been allowed to join third-tier Reading on loan for their forthcoming 2025-26 campaign.

There, the 20-year-old will link up with former Pompey League Two title-winner and Eire forward Noel Hunt, who is currently in charge of the Leasing Car Select Stadium outfit.

The striker, who has featured four times for the Seagulls following his move from Cork in 2023, has been allowed to go out again on loan as he looks for consistent minutes as senior level.

After arriving from Brighton last summer, O’Mahony featured 13 times for John Mousinho’s side and scored three goals. However, his time at Fratton Park was affected by injury, with three different issues impacting his ability to force his way properly into the starting XI.

No doubt, his best moment in a Pompey shirt came at Oxford United’s Kassam Stadium in March, when the Irishman stylishly smashed home the Blues’ second goal in the 2-0 win after coming off the substitutes’ bench.

John Mousinho on Mark O’Mahony’s Pompey loan

Speaking after O’Mahony’s Pompey exit at the end of last season, Mousinho told The News: ‘When you strip everything back for Mark, it has been an incredibly successful loan for him personally.

‘He’s had the highs of coming in and scoring against Oxford, against Stoke, at Oxford again. The highs of starting games at Championship level and performing really well.

‘Then he’s had the lows of picking up the injury against Swansea and another away on international duty. He’s probably had the lows of not being in the squad towards the back end of the season as well, not quite hitting the levels that he’d hit earlier in the year.

‘As a first loan he’s had everything and that’s really important. He has made a contribution to us staying in the league, a big contribution, he’s started plenty of games, he’s come off the bench in plenty of games, he absolutely would have wanted to have played more.

‘I think he has gone back to Brighton a much better player, so it has been a really successful loan for him.

‘A first loan can be incredibly difficult. The environment players come out of at Premier League 2 level is very, very different to what they are faced with in the Championship - and there's nothing you can really do to try to replicate that.

‘To make that adjustment is big and first loans often fall flat on their face, some players are sent back in January, but Mark definitely wasn’t one of those.’

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