'We got exactly what we deserved': Portsmouth boss blasts players after Derby horror show

The Blues slumped to a 3-0 deficit after just 29 minutes and eventually lost 4-0 against a previously out-of-form team which had won just once in 11 matches.

It was an alarming display from Mousinho’s men considering recent impressive form which had dragged them free of the Championship relegation zone.

Afterwards, Pompey’s head coach conceded the scoreline may have been far greater - and insisted there couldn’t be any complaints.

He told The News: ‘It wasn’t very good to say the least, we got exactly what we deserved and maybe got off slightly lightly.

‘The start was really poor, we didn’t start on the front foot, we invited too much pressure. There was a chance early on just to let the ball run through to the goalkeeper, which we didn’t do, and off the back of that Derby had a couple of chances, a couple of corners, a couple of free-kicks.

‘We started settling into the game when it was 1-0 down, but then conceded from a set-piece. It was a strange first half because it didn’t feel like wave after wave of attack from Derby, but it did feel like every time they ran forward they scored.

‘The second half was the reverse, wave after wave of attack but Derby didn’t score quite as many and we didn’t have any control of the game or any meaningful possession whatsoever.

‘The most disappointing thing is we seemed to get everything wrong. That was tactically as staff.

‘But you can always mask that if you are brave and you win your individual battles, win second balls, defend corners properly, defend your box properly - and we just didn’t do any of that.’

Although there were a number of poor performances in the back four, Mousinho pointed to the deficiencies in the entire team defensively.

Certainly Kane Wilson’s eighth-minute opener was the fault of Josh Murphy, who had failed to track the right-back.

He added: ‘That’s not just the back four, that’s the entire XI, in terms of the way we let them get out on too many occasions far too easily.

‘Josh ends up a yard off Kane Wilson and you end up making up that extra yard at the back end. If Josh was 80 yards away from him, fine, but he got back in.

‘It’s not just Josh, it was everybody, we were a yard off everything and that summed up our performance.

‘We couldn’t quite get to anything in terms of the challenges, headers, any of the duels.’