John Mousinho Pompey v Peterborough verdict

The News, Portsmouth

Pompey boss John Mousinho gives his reaction to his side's 3-1 EFL League One win over Peterborough United.

Transcript

00:00 John, Pompey win 3-1 against Peter, an excellent performance.

00:07 Yeah, that's the most important thing to the result, first and foremost, and the performance

00:11 I thought was outstanding, certainly for 70 minutes after a bit of an indifferent start.

00:16 I didn't think we were terrible, but they caught us on the break and scored a decent

00:20 enough goal, not necessarily against the run of play, but I thought we were well in the

00:24 game and hadn't taken advantage of some good opportunities that we had.

00:28 And the reaction after that was excellent. I think from then on we just looked like the

00:32 better side throughout, particularly in the second half, we were excellent in the second

00:36 half. A couple of players looked like they got their second wind and it was relentless,

00:39 I thought, kicking into the flattened end. I thought we thoroughly deserved it. I didn't

00:45 think we looked threatened at all until we went down to 10 men, so performance-wise really,

00:48 really happy.

00:49 Something about the second half, it must have been one of the best second halves you've

00:51 had, or one of the best halves you've had this season, really.

00:54 I think so, yes. You look at a couple of the, in my short time here, a couple of the performances

00:59 that we've put in at home especially, the Bolton one stands out, this one certainly

01:03 stands out as well. Both three ones, I did actually feel relatively calm in the second

01:08 half, which was quite rare for me, probably until we went down to 10 men and they had

01:12 11 minutes on the back end of the game. But I just felt we were in control and I didn't

01:17 think that we were particularly threatened going in behind. And that was all with trying

01:23 to be expansive in terms of the way we were playing as well. So, yes, really happy with

01:27 that. It's difficult to really assess properly now because of the emotion of the game and

01:33 the view that I have there. But once we settle down with the coaching staff over the next

01:36 couple of days, it will be really easy to pick apart everything from the game.

01:41 3-1 when it was 11 v 11, they were clinging on as well, weren't they? You could have got

01:44 a few more.

01:45 That's what I thought. That was probably the only slight, it's not a negative of the

01:49 afternoon, the only slight part that we can keep improving upon is putting those games

01:53 to bed. I thought we had chance after chance. A few goalmouth scrambles, the goalkeeper

01:57 made a couple of great saves, particularly the one I thought was an outstanding save

02:01 near side on the near post to Abu's shot. We hit the bar, I think it was a bit of a

02:06 loopy lucky header, but we hit the bar. A load of set pieces, which we scored from one

02:11 set piece, so great. I thought the delivery on a couple of the others just needs to be

02:15 better because we've got really good routines, we've got a really attacking threat in the

02:18 box as I'm sure you saw there. Once we nail that down and be a bit more ruthless, I think

02:24 we'll be fine.

02:25 Following a conservative goal of straws in the league, how needed was that today?

02:29 It's been no secret, we speak about this in the press, we speak about it after games.

02:33 We want to try and score more goals. One of the things that you and I spoke about this

02:36 week was the fact that we didn't necessarily feel that we weren't scoring because of how

02:41 defensive we'd been. We didn't feel we were stuck in a defensive mode, we just needed

02:44 a bit more creativity going forward and a bit more quality in some of those moments.

02:50 We got that today, so when we get that bit of quality from Marlon Pack on the cross for

02:55 the first goal, maybe a slight slice of luck on the second because I think it went through

02:59 a couple of bodies and then Abu put it in the back of the net. Apart from that, I think

03:03 the build-up to the third goal when we recycled it, there was some real quality on display

03:08 there. The little dink up to the back post, a little one-two Marlon with Abu and flashed

03:12 across bodies in the box, Regan pulled at the back post. That has obviously been our

03:17 focus and we want to keep scoring more goals.

03:20 I read that Marlon Pack involved in all three goals.

03:23 Yes, and if you look at him and think that's not the performance of a 32-year-old. He looked

03:32 energetic and we know he is. He looked energetic, he ran the game. It's a pleasure to have because

03:37 of the fact that he is almost a coach on the pitch for us. He really is a coach on the

03:41 pitch and he does a lot with us at the training ground. He is a really good sounding board

03:47 for us. Not just him, a couple of the other senior pros as well. A real pleasure and privilege.

03:52 One of the reasons he was made club captain and started every game and played almost every

03:56 minute of every game. I thought today was his best performance of the season.

03:59 For a holding midfielder to be involved in three goals as well, you don't expect that?

04:03 No, he's got that quality and one of the things we were trying to do today was make sure that

04:06 even though we played Marlon and Joe close together as sixes, they still have the ability

04:11 to release if Peterford don't leave two men up. We want to get them involved, especially

04:16 at the edge of the box. Marlon's got that goal scoring ability. We saw at the back end

04:20 of last season, I think he finished with five or six goals last year. One of our top scorers

04:26 I think in behind that chasing pack of Colby. He's got a huge amount of quality with assists,

04:31 he can score goals and he can run games. He's a terrific player and leader to have.

04:37 Just because he sits deeper, doesn't mean you don't expect him to contribute with goals

04:41 and assists and attacking play?

04:42 No, we're not necessarily looking to make those lung-bursting runs into the box but

04:46 he can certainly lock off the box on the second phase and be on the edge of it. One that really

04:51 springs to mind is my first game here when we played Exeter. The play's developed really

04:55 quickly down the right, we've crossed it, the loopy header back up to the edge of the

04:58 box and that's where we want our central midfielders. We don't want them sitting on the toes of

05:01 the centre-backs. We can always get a full-back to come in and shove one of the midfielders

05:06 up for lack of having a better term for that. We do want them to get involved.

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