Pompey boss John Mousinho's Fleetwood Town preview

The News, Portsmouth

Pompey boss John Mousinho gives his Fleetwood Town preview and discusses all the injury news and issues ahead of the clash at Fratton Park.

Transcript

00:00 So Jon, obviously Fleetwood at home on Saturday, you head into it on the offer back in terms

00:06 of the league, four wins in a row, four clean sheets, you made a lot of changes in the week,

00:10 presumably for this game back to the league you'll make those changes back?

00:14 Yeah I think the plan was to make sure that we rested a few players and we got minutes

00:18 into a few of the other lads that hadn't had the number of minutes in the legs that we'd

00:22 have liked to have at this point so yeah we've got obviously plenty of selection ahead of

00:28 us in terms of players that are available, players that are coming back and they've had

00:31 a decent week's worth of training and yeah so there'll be a much changed side to Tuesday

00:35 night.

00:36 You rested a number of first team players, that seemed like they'd be doing a lot of

00:40 good having that refresh I suppose in the week.

00:42 I think so, they've just played a lot of games over the past three or four weeks and it's

00:46 not just the number of games that they've played, I think it's the nature of them, first

00:49 of all three out of four away games, having the blow of losing to Blackpool as well was

00:54 tough, I think mentally pretty tough for the group but they came back in those four games

00:58 three away games, performed really well but always with a long, long way to travel from

01:02 Portsmouth and the other one was just a massive, massive home game against Bolton I think that

01:07 took a lot emotionally out of the group and probably out of everybody in the city from

01:11 both sides so I think it was one of those that was well worth having the ability to

01:15 rest the lads, really, really important for us, we got a bit of training work into them

01:19 and that was a real bonus for us as well.

01:20 What do you make of Fleetwood?

01:22 I think obviously their league position isn't where they'd like to be, they've struggled

01:25 a bit this season and they're not on the greatest run but they do have some really accomplished

01:30 players at this level, just two up front, the likes of Jadon Stockley, Jack Marriott,

01:35 so really good players, they've got that throughout the squad, not just up top and they've got

01:39 a really good head coach who's coached at a much higher level as well so they have the

01:44 ingredients to put on a really good performance and get results, they definitely do and I

01:48 think they were pretty unlucky I suppose not to get an equaliser against Peterborough towards

01:52 the back end of the game last week and not many sides restrict Peterborough to only one

01:56 goal, they managed to do that so I think they'll be relatively pleased with the way things

02:00 went last week and coming into today, bizarrely, well not bizarrely, I understand it with a

02:07 good bit of confidence, it might seem like it's a strange thing to outsiders but I think

02:10 they're going to have a bit of confidence, going to come and want to cause an upset so

02:12 we've got to be right at it.

02:14 In terms of injuries, how are they?

02:16 So we've got Tom Lowry we spoke about, he's having a scan today on his calf, we don't

02:22 think it's too bad but we just want to make sure there's nothing there more for his own

02:26 peace of mind than anything else and I don't think it's going to be one where he's going

02:29 to be able to participate this weekend but beyond that hopefully we can get him back

02:33 to possibly joining in one of these Christmas games, that would be nice because he is very

02:37 close to returning to being fully fit.

02:40 Anthony Scully came through the 45 minutes absolutely fine, he came through unscathed.

02:44 Conor Ogilvie has been out on the grass today, he's got two weeks I would say until he's

02:48 back in full training which is real positive and then the other ones, Zach Swanson is struggling

02:56 slightly with his groins coming off the other night, a recurring problem that he has had

03:00 for a while, we thought we got over it at the back end of last season with surgery and

03:05 all the rehab that he did in the summer but we just have to see how that one is settled

03:09 down over the next couple of days.

03:10 The final one is that Christian Sainz is 50/50 for the weekend, he picked up a knock in what

03:15 I thought was a really poor heavy challenge towards the back end of the game, the referee

03:20 decided to let it go unpunished, a bit bizarrely in my eyes but I did ask the question at the

03:25 time but the fourth official told me that our players didn't react enough for it to

03:30 be deemed a foul which I thought was very strange because when our players do react

03:33 they get booked so I'm not entirely sure where we stand on that.

03:36 So he's 50/50 for this?

03:37 He's 50/50, I don't know if you remember the challenge, it was a really poor one and he

03:45 ends up taking a knock to his foot so his foot's swollen, no surprise if you go and

03:49 watch it back.

03:50 Presumably Colby's now come back and is in contention to start this match?

03:53 Yeah Colby's back, he's fully fit so he'll be in contention to start the weekend.

03:57 With Oga, you say he's back on grass, he's not in full training yet?

04:01 No not yet, full training in two weeks, he's back out on the grass, he's done a lot of

04:05 running today, I think he was out there with the S&C team or the physiotherapy team, he's

04:09 progressing nicely.

04:10 Connor we've got to be careful with because he spent a long period out before he started

04:14 against Cambridge and then he played for eight seconds and then he's been out for a decent

04:19 period as well so you've probably got to put the two together in terms of his return protocol

04:23 and he'll be back in full training in a couple of weeks and then it's probably going to be

04:27 two, three, four weeks maybe once he's really fit again for match fitness.

04:34 So you're looking February then for him?

04:36 Probably the end of Jan, Feb yeah.

04:38 Tino Andrion as well?

04:40 Yeah Tino is rehabbing nicely, we don't have the day to day contact that we have with the

04:45 injuries here but Tino's doing well in Chelsea, we still speak to him occasionally.

04:50 We suspect that Tino's probably going to be a mid-February one as well.

04:54 Again February, you're looking for him as well?

04:56 Yeah, with the severity of Tino's injury and how bad the hamstring tear was, these things

05:02 are going to take a long time to rehab and again with the nature of it, it's one that

05:07 we want to make sure, particularly coupled with Tino and his injury history and how we

05:11 want to be really careful with him and not risk anything coming back, we just want to

05:15 make sure he is fully fit before we even entertain training.

05:17 Are you encouraged over how these injuries do appear to be clearing up at the moment?

05:22 Yeah and it comes in waves, there's peaks and troughs.

05:26 We went to Burton the other week and I think we fielded the 18 fit pros that we had and

05:31 at the weekend I think we left four or five pros out of the squad so that's the way that

05:39 these things happen.

05:40 We picked up maybe a couple more this week but then there's a couple that have returned

05:43 as well so that's the way that these things fall.

05:46 We just have to make sure that we keep the ones that are preventable as preventable as

05:49 possible.

05:50 There were some that we just pick up through no fault of our own, they just happen.

05:54 Christian Sadie was a good example and yeah, just get on with it and make sure we can cope

05:57 with it as a squad.

05:58 Thank you.

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