What irked Portsmouth legend most about disappointing Blues performance against MK Dons and why he believes boos at final whistle were understandable

The former Blues striker and boss, who is now a pundit on BBC Solent, said Danny Cowley’s side failed to meet basic Fratton Park expectations during their 2-0 defeat to the managerless Dons.

He believes there was no fight or aggression in their play as Pompey stretched their winless run to six league games.

And Whittingham said there was a real danger of the Blues’ season petering out as they dropped to 10th in the table.

The Boos that rang out at the final whistle followed chants of ‘this is embarrassing’ during the game and after many fans walked out when Jack Tucker doubled the visitors’ lead on 64 minutes following Bradley Johnson’s first-half opener.

It also followed a similar reaction to Pompey’s last League One result, when they lost to Wycombe two weeks ago.

Pompey have eight days to work on their current problems, with a trip to Exeter on Boxing Day next up.

Whittingham knows exactly what the focus of the MK Dons post-mortem should be.

Speaking on BBC Solent after the game, he said: ‘There’s expectations at Portsmouth – and quite rightly so as well.

‘But there’s certainly expectations when you’re playing a team down the bottom that you compete as well as they do – and Portsmouth haven’t.

‘It’s as simple as that and the boos are very much what you would expect from a performance like that – just not aggressive enough.

‘They didn’t look like a team, whereas MK Dons, I thought they fought hard for each other.’

When asked what the solution is, Whittingham added: ‘You remind them of what the basics are, what you’re expected to do as a Portsmouth player. You fight for everything.

‘You’re aggressive in what you do, not to think that the fans here will take anything less.

‘I’m not saying individuals didn’t fight, but as a team, when one person went to close someone down the other people didn’t bother. There’s a lot of that going on.

‘There needs to be some motivation in that changing room coming soon otherwise this season is just going to peter out.’

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