‘Why not?’: Portsmouth boss ponders unleashing Bishop AND Yengi on Oxford United

John Mousinho is weighing up letting loose BOTH of his strikers on Oxford United.

And the Pompey boss admitted Kusini Yengi is giving him much to ponder when it comes to his team selection for the League One run-in.

The Blues boss may have a chronic lack of midfielders at present, but when it comes to his attackers he has plenty of options.

And one of his biggest calls at the moment, is who leads the line out of top scorer Colby Bishop and Yengi.

The Aussie favourite could count himself unlucky to come out of the side after a man-of-the-match performance against Cambridge United earlier this month.

Mousinho opted to utilise both strikers as he chased a win at Charlton last weekend, after Bishop got the nod to start in his preferred 4-2-3-1 formation.

The Magic Man operated in a deeper role with Yengi using his pace and power to disrupt the home defence, who’d performed impressively. 

The Pompey boss feels that showing gives him food for thought moving forward.

Mousinho said: ‘We did get both Colby and Kas on the pitch at Charlton, without changing shape as well.

‘We’ve needed to change shape in the past to get them both on the pitch and gone to a three with two up top. We thought at the weekend the shape wasn’t the issue, we could just get another attacking player on the pitch.

‘It’s a definite thing for us to think about - whether it’s both of them on the pitch or who starts at the weekend.

‘Why not? (play both). We obviously want to keep some semblance of how we play, but we created our best chance at the weekend with them both on and Kas helping the ball on to Myles (Peart-Harris) running beyond him.

‘They will definitely cause teams problems when they’re both on the pitch.’

Bishop has been the man firmly in possession of the role leading the line for Pompey, since his £500,000 arrival from Accrington in the summer of 2022.

A total of 40 goals has been bagged in that time, but Yengi has also been a success since arriving on these shores last summer - and has looked particularly sharp since arriving back from international duty with Australia at the start of last month.

Mousinho said: ‘It’s a tough one for us every week.

‘We spoke after the Cambridge game in terms of Kas giving us a headache coming back from the Asia Cup looking as sharp as he did.

‘He really affected the game and topped it off with a goal. You have to balance that off with our top scorer from last season and our top scorer this season- and everything Colby gives us.

‘It’s a really good headache to have - two centre-forwards who are at the top of their games and offer really different things.’