Pompey 2-1 Lincoln: John Mousinho's post-match reaction

The News, Portsmouth

Blues head coach John Mousinho talks to The News after seeing his side stay top of the league with victory against the Imps

Transcript

00:00 John, another victory, still top of the league. A strange old game though, considering you

00:04 dominated most of it and it got a bit nervy at the end, didn't it?

00:07 Yeah, I think that's what happens against good sides. I think Lincoln are a really good

00:10 side. They've only lost one game this season to Bolton on the opening day. I think Bolton

00:15 are an excellent side at this level. They caused us a couple of problems towards the

00:21 end but I thought by and large for the rest of the game we were really in control, really

00:24 comfortable. I think it's sometimes difficult when you are that comfortable to break yourselves

00:29 out of it because these sides are always a threat but we've all been really pleased

00:33 with the performance and obviously delighted with the result.

00:36 At times you seem to lose that zip. Were they a bit tired after the heavy schedule, do you feel?

00:39 Possibly. I thought it was more of a mental one this afternoon. We just dropped a bit

00:45 deep because we were protecting the lead towards the back end of the game and then when we

00:49 did break we were just very, very nearly there. Some of it's physical off the back of Saturday,

00:54 Tuesday but some of it's getting players up to speed as well. Tino came on at a couple

00:58 of really good moments but he's nearly there with a couple of the other moments. Once we

01:01 get him up to full pace then those are the sort of games that if he does come off the

01:04 bench he'll be able to impact and hopefully put the game away. I think we have players

01:11 that have done a lot over the past couple of weeks, particularly with Saturday, Tuesday

01:14 so I'm completely willing to forgive that. I think the most important thing is that we

01:18 did look very, very strong for large parts of the game.

01:20 Yeah, large parts you controlled, you dominated and it was needlessly nervy at the end of

01:26 this post, wasn't it?

01:27 I thought I'm always going to say that as well, it always feels needlessly nervy. It

01:31 seems like when you concede goals, what all head coaches and managers say, they say they're

01:35 soft. It's very rarely that you concede a goal that you don't think is soft because

01:38 I think they're preventable. I think we were a bit unlucky in the goal today actually.

01:42 But needlessly, yes and no because Lincoln were always going to come out if we didn't

01:49 have that extra goal cushion. But I do agree, I thought some of the decision making wasn't

01:54 quite there. It will come with the group. They've not been used to, I guess not need

02:01 to get used to winning games a bit more comfortably. That's something that comes with experience,

02:05 a bit of confidence, a bit of cohesion with the team and yeah, we'll definitely be working

02:10 on that.

02:11 Is that because you've got a few young lads there as well, they're still learning?

02:14 Yeah, we've got some young lads in there. We've also got plenty of experience inside

02:18 so I don't think we can use that as an excuse. I look at the side today and we're not,

02:23 I think we're probably a pretty young average age but we've still got plenty of heads on

02:26 there that know what they're doing in the Football League. It's about everybody making

02:30 good decisions and it spreads throughout the team. I'm being nitpicky here, it's just

02:36 one of those things where after everything that the team has dealt with this week, maybe

02:43 just a little scrappy one at the end is the way you pick up points.

02:46 Is that what you're saying, it's a scrappy result?

02:47 No, I didn't to be honest. I thought we were well, well in control. I thought we performed

02:52 really, really well, just slightly scrappy towards the end. When you get away with the

02:57 chance that Lincoln had at the end, I thought it would have been really, really tough on

03:00 us to not have won the game but you can't leave yourself open to those sort of opportunities.

03:05 The set-piece, long ball in the box, ball drops down on the edge and if you put it in

03:11 the back of the net, I think we really, really grew just not seeing the game off properly.

03:16 So performance-wise I actually thought it was really, really professional and I thought

03:20 we completely dominated and controlled it for large parts.

03:23 How important was Will Norris then at the end, to stop his time with that save?

03:26 Yeah, brilliant. Will's been outstanding for the entire season and pre-season since

03:32 we had him in. Not just his distribution but he's not been called upon a huge amount but

03:36 when he's been called upon he's made those saves. He's aggressive off his line, he comes

03:40 and makes sure that he tries to dominate whenever he can which is brilliant. Sometimes if he

03:45 comes off and he's aggressive and he drops the ball, I don't care, he's going to save

03:49 us far more than otherwise. So I'm really pleased for him.

03:52 It's a good point because he has to maintain concentration when you guys have so much control

03:56 and then you have to rely on him at the end there to get that save.

03:59 Yeah, yeah. It's really tough. Funny you say concentration, it's one of the points we

04:04 made to the lads before the game. When you have that much possession, which we thought

04:07 we did today and the midfield set-up to frustrate us, you have to concentrate. You've got to

04:11 make sure that you are very, very switched on when you're in possession to make sure

04:16 that the transition is right. When you deal with set-pieces, when you deal with long throws,

04:21 corners, all those sort of things, you've got to make sure that you're switched on.

04:24 Obviously he's disappointed about the second goal of the week as well.

04:27 Yeah, I'm trying to think. You know what, maybe he is. I didn't speak to him about it

04:33 because frankly he's been brilliant and goalkeepers are always going to be disappointed with goals

04:40 that they get to maybe and let in. I just can't think of any goals that I can really

04:48 have a go at or have a pop at and be annoyed about. He's just been absolutely excellent.

04:52 He's been a breath of fresh air coming in and he does so much for the side that everybody

04:58 makes mistakes. Goalkeepers get punished when they do make mistakes. That's one of the unfortunate

05:02 things but our players make plenty more mistakes than we do.

05:05 You just fear the worst with that head of the head and that stuff you saw with the guy.

05:09 Yeah, you always do. I'm always pretty nervous towards the end. Just making sure that we

05:14 try and see games off better if we 3-1 or 4-1 at that point, which I didn't think would have

05:20 been an unreasonable scoreline, then it's a lot less nerve-wracking.

05:23 Thank you.

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