A little bit of ‘shame’ and a lot of pride for departing Portsmouth RFC head coach Neil McRoberts

The departing head coach is saddened he was unable to deliver promotion from the London 3 South West in his two-season stay at the club.

McRoberts' time at Rugby Camp has been brought to a premature end after the RFU's decision to cancel the season because of the coronavirus outbreak.

With just three games of the campaign remaining anyway, Portsmouth were sixth and out of the promotion picture.

McRoberts also fell short in his bid to guide them back to London 2 South West last season - his first at the helm - as they finished in third.

And he has a theory as to why his squad were unable to match their achievements from the previous campaign.

‘It’s just a bit of a shame, I’ll always have a bit of a shame when I look back on it, we didn’t quite get promoted because it was something I so wanted for the club,' McRoberts reflected.

‘But it didn’t quite happen for us.

‘Last year, we managed to find focus on a regular basis which gave us consistency in performance and the quality that you need.

‘I think we were perhaps a little guilty of not reaching those same levels in terms of focus that gives you the consistency to be able to succeed.

‘As a consequence of that, we were too erratic with our performances from one week until the next.

‘We never really got a run of results together.

‘I think in any sport if you’re going to get promoted, you need to put a run together at some stage during the season of six weeks’ worth of consistent performances, possibly more.

‘We never really achieved that this year.

‘Last year we did and we got a little bit closer.

‘From a player perspective, looking back on it we lost a lot of quality from what we had last year.

‘We lost a lot of those players, (but) we recruited the quality to replace that loss back into the squad.

‘We perhaps didn’t do it across a spread of positions.'

Despite the tinge of disappointment, McRoberts will walk away with a sense of pride in a number of other aspects.

Portsmouth were just one win away from Twickenham but went down to Honiton in the RFU Senior Vase semi-finals last term.

Add to that a third place finish in the league and ending runners-up in the county cup, it was a good first campaign.

And McRoberts insisted the club are in a good place with his 'fantastic' successor Gareth Richards.

‘We achieved some really good successes both on and off the pitch,’ he remarked.

‘For me, the highlight of my time being in charge will be getting to the last four of a national competition.

‘Last year, we probably didn’t talk about it or celebrate it as much as we should have.

‘The fact is that in that national competition we were down to the last four in a competition that had 1,100 entries at the beginning of it.

‘There are just short of 1,100 eligible for that competition at the outset.

‘We ended up in the last four of it.

‘It’s a huge shame we didn’t quite get to Twickenham to play in the final.

‘But I think for a club like Portsmouth, it was the first time they’d got that far, the first time they’d been regional champions - we were the south-east region champions.

‘I think for me that is the proudest thing from a first-team perspective.

‘On a wider perspective, I think the club has to be proud of the player base that we have.

‘We’ve had a net gain for two years in a row of players into the senior set up.

'Gareth Richards is taking over as the head coach and I think that is a fantastic thing for the club.

‘He played last year for a large portion of the season for me either as a fly-half or 12.

‘Gareth was great to have on the pitch or in the squad last year.

‘Unfortunately, he picked up a very bad knee injury towards the last quarter of the season and then moved into the coaching.

‘He’s been brilliant to work with this year, I think he’ll do a fantastic job as head coach.'

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Portsmouth this season finished in their lowest position since being relegated from London 2 South West at the end of the 2016/17 season.

In 2017/18 they finished third, winning 18 of their 22 league games.

They boasted a plus points difference of 499 and finished just eight points behind champions Old Cranleighans.

The next season - Neil McRoberts’ first as head coach - Portsmouth again finished third.

This time they won 15 of their 22 games, finishing 18 points ahead of fourth-placed Old Tiffians.

However, this time they were 22 points adrift of champions Winchester - twice conceding over 40 points (40-7 away and 46-21 at Rugby Camp) to their Hampshire rivals.

Under McRoberts, though, Portsmouth did inflict one of only two losses on second-placed Battersea Ironsides.

This season started well with Portsmouth winning their opening four league games. But the rot set in as they lost their next four, and they were never able to recover any real consistency after that.

They were also forced to withdraw from the Senior Vase - just a few months after getting to within a game of Twickenham - as they could not raise a team for the trip to divisional leaders Reeds Weybridge.

Portsmouth were last in London 1 South in 2011/12, and the highest they have finished since then was fifth in London 2 South West in 2015.16 - 12 months before relegation.