The key to how Portsmouth got their promotion charge back on track against Shrewsbury

The Blues boss’ double second-half substitution emphatically paid off as his side picked up a 2-0 win over Shrewsbury as Storm Dennis battered Fratton Park.

Ross McCrorie and John Marquis were sent on for Gareth Evans and James Bolton is an attacking move in the 58th minute in front of a crowd of 18,214.

Within six minutes McCrorie had supplied the cross for Ellis Harrison to open the scoring, before Marquis settled the game with eight minutes remaining.

The result put to bed the mid-week loss against Coventry and closed the gap on both the promotion places and leaders Rotherham to just four points, with 14 league games remaining

Jackett’s assistant, Joe Gallen, saluted the Pompey boss for making the changes which finally broke Shrewsbury’s stubborn resistance.

Gallen said: ‘I think the manager takes the credit for it.

‘There’s discussions and chats which take place all week about everything.

‘But come matchday the manager has to make the decisions.

‘There’s a difference between having good ideas and making the right decisions.

‘It was his decision to bring on those two players and it certainly worked for us.

‘It’s nice when it comes off because it certainly gets mentioned when it doesn’t!’

The Shrewsbury win continues a frenetic period of 13 games in six weeks for Pompey - with that clash the first of eight fixtures at Fratton Park from the next 10.

Gallen believes the amount of home games alleviates some of the concern about fatigue as he made a comedic reference to it getting down to the nitty gritty.

He added: ‘It’s business time - like Flight of the Conchords!

‘We’ve got a lot of home games. That doesn’t mean we’re going to do it.

‘It does mean we’ve got less travelling, though, and if we can get into a rhythm at home and pick up results that will help.

‘We’re still involved in three competitions, which is great really.

‘I don’t think the fatigue thing even comes into it right now. There’s not even a thought of it.

‘I think we can get into a real, good rhythm and habit of playing Saturday, Tuesday now.

‘It does help the Tuesday games are at home. It doesn’t mean we’re going to win but there’s the travelling. If we were away for the five Tuesdays that would be a bit different.

‘We’re not so that helps and now we have to play and perform well in a game that could take us back to Wembley. That’s something we really want.’