00:03John, another really good night's work and 19 minutes banked, two times 45.
00:07Yeah, a very different night, I think, to last night in terms of the way that Farnborough came and set up here today.
00:13So it gave us a lot of problems, I think, in terms of the way that they played.
00:17And, yeah, a really, really good run-out, really good run-out in the end to get through the two 45s.
00:22I think injury-free is really positive and performance and result really happy with us as well.
00:27In terms of the education of some of the younger lads, the physicality they faced up to would be another landmark box tick for them.
00:34Yeah, really important, I think, for them to step up to the level and realise that, first of all, they haven't got any time on the ball.
00:40There's not a lot of space.
00:41And when we do play them, when we do try and switch the ball quickly, again, sides like this, with the physicality they displayed, the athleticism they showed, they got on top of them really quickly.
00:49So a good lesson.
00:50And, you know, I thought they were going to still up to it really well, to be honest, considering it's only sort of the second week of pre-season for them.
00:56We've got some first years out there as well.
00:58And, yeah, that was really positive, particularly for the likes of, you know, the likes of Fraser coming into the side, who's never set foot on a football pitch in a first-team environment before.
01:06So really happy with that.
01:07I was going to say, the lads that played the first half, obviously they tried a bit towards the end, but they were the ones that were probably the younger ones that had the bigger challenge in a way, didn't they, with that in the first half?
01:15Yeah, I think so. In particular, you know, Trinidadou played last night as well. Again, sort of his first taste of senior football was, you know, was a really good bit of exposure for him.
01:28Bo's been out for a long time as well, so that coupled with the fact we were asking him to step up to the level and then Fraser coming in as a 16-year-old as a first-year, very, very pleasing to see them show those glimpses.
01:38And, again, I thought Mike performed really well in the second half off the back of a really good performance last night.
01:43Yeah, and Nathan Ferguson still with you. What's the situation with Nathan at the moment?
01:47Nothing's changed really in terms of where Nathan's at. We're still having a look at him. It's been really useful for Nathan to be with us from both perspectives, so mutually beneficial in terms of us having a look at Nathan.
01:59Nathan getting the minutes, the first time Nathan's played in a long, long time as well in a sort of semi-competitive fixture, so really good for him.
02:06And, yeah, we'll keep monitoring that over, I guess, over the next week or so. We'll play Crawley and then see where we are after that.
02:13So he's here for the time being, anyway?
02:16Yeah, here for the time being.
02:17Yeah. I'd say mutually beneficial was the term I was going to use, actually, so whatever happens, you know, he can be helpful for Pompey now and himself moving forward.
02:24I think so. So regardless of what happens, you know, Nathan's had a really good stint training, first of all.
02:31So he'd actually trained with us at the back end of the last season, so I think overall now he's been training for about six months and fit for a lot longer than that.
02:40First 90 minutes of football over two days for a long time for him, so getting through that's really important.
02:45And, you know, clearly with some of the injuries that we've got at the moment and the fact that Nate's come in and he's done well, it's really good to have a look at him tonight.
02:52You had a trial as keeper last night. He wasn't here tonight. What's the situation? Is it Alfie Whiteman?
02:56Yeah, we just changed the two keepers. That was always the plan.
02:59Is he still here? Alfie's still here, yeah. Alfie will probably feature at the weekend.
03:04OK, so again, similar situation to Nathan, is it?
03:06Yeah, just again, having a look at the situation there. One thing that we're keen to do is have four goalkeepers.
03:16A lot of that is down to having the squad depth and also it's really beneficial for training.
03:21All of the time, well, pretty much every single week we're going to have games where, sorry, we're going to have training sessions where we use four goalkeepers.
03:27We have two small-sided games, so we need that quality. We've stepped up a level from where we've been in the last couple of years.
03:32We wanted to let Toby out on loan, so rather than having sort of training goalkeepers or, you know, ruining the academy session, it's really important for us to have that sort of squad depth.
03:41No matter if it's 24 hours or a week that I'll speak to you, this question is going to come anyway.
03:46Mark Kosniewski mentioned again a suggestion of interest in there. Can you say anything on that?
03:50Yeah, just the same response as last night. As long as he's contracted to another football club then, yeah, we won't comment on it.
03:56There's the box ticked on that one. On the pitch, Zach Swanson deployed in the field for the second time. Is that just a situation at the moment?
04:03It needs to, you know, fill holes or is that something you're looking at?
04:05A bit of both. So we still primarily see Zach as a right-back and, you know, a right-back that performed very well for us last season.
04:13The situation for us at the moment in terms of players that we have in the building, so John wasn't quite ready to play tonight.
04:19We didn't want to really take the risk. So the situation that we have with players in the building means that we're not flush with sixes or eights.
04:25So Doz are playing as a six in the first half means that we needed to sort of fill those gaps and we have right-backs.
04:32We have right-backs with Mike, obviously Jordan and the same situation for Terry really.
04:38We probably still see Terry maybe 50-50 right-back and more as a 10 or more as an eight.
04:43But Terry's slightly different to Zach because he came in originally as a central midfielder.
04:47So I think going forwards, we would probably see Zach more as a right-back, but what we want to do is make sure he gets the minutes in.
04:53And to be honest, I think particularly tonight he performed very, very well.
04:57Yeah, and the second night in succession, Connor Shocknessy and Regan, Paul, I think it would be like November 23, wouldn't it?
05:02So it would have been a while since those two have been together.
05:04Yeah, yeah, a long time, a long time. And it's positive to see both of them back together.
05:09It's positive to see Shox in particular, who didn't have a huge amount of game time last season.
05:13Regan came back from the ACL injury and performed Malfrost last year.
05:16But Shox in particular with the amount of games that he missed, it's really pleasing to see him slot back in.
05:20And obviously the blend of those together, how do you like that?
05:22Say again?
05:22The blend of those two together, that partnership, how do you like those two together?
05:26Yeah, I mean, they were pivotal in that league one season and we had quite a few partnerships last year, a few different partnerships.
05:32And it's one of those departments where we want to be strong.
05:35We do have a lot of contracted centre-halves at the moment.
05:37We've got five contracted centre-halves. Unfortunately, Tom and Ibs aren't available at the minute.
05:41But yeah, the two of those, I think, have showed a lot of promise.
05:45And to be honest, I thought Hayden's performance in the second half, particularly with the ball, was excellent as well.
05:48Yeah, you just touched on Ibs there. We haven't managed to quite catch up on the latest with him. Can you bring us up to speed?
05:53It's just about pain management for Ibs. So he's seeing a specialist and a consultant on that side.
05:59So it's nothing to do with the actual patella tendon itself. It is to do with that knee that he injured, but not to do with the patella tendon.
06:03And there's just other issues that he's having in there, but there's nothing structural. It's just about making sure that we get Ibs in the right position where he's comfortable playing through that.
06:11And that's just going to take a bit of, I think, a bit of finesse, a bit of expertise.
06:15And we're hoping that Ibs will back out on the grass today, not with a full training group, but with the training group that we have with the likes of Lange and Colby and John as well.
06:24So, yeah, we're hoping to have Ibs back possibly available for the weekend and just seeing how he can manage that pain.
06:29So when you say specialist, then everyone hit me immediately, panic stations, but you say like...
06:33Pain management specialist, yeah.
06:34Yeah.
06:34So it's a completely different field when there's not a specific injury there, but the player is in a fair bit of pain.
06:42You would have seen from the session in Slovakia where he pulled out and he couldn't continue there.
06:47But we're not concerned about the structure of the knee. We're not concerned about the tatella tendon.
06:50It's just finding solutions to make sure that he gets through.
06:54And when you come back from 12 months out, I guess these little bits and pieces are going to come up along the way.
06:59They happen, yeah. Whether it's something like that with pain management or it's, you know, as we've experienced over the past couple of seasons with players coming back and picking up other injuries, that does happen.
07:08It happened with Jacob. It happened with Regan. It happened with Shox. It happened with Tom McIntyre as well.
07:13We're doing our best to try and protect against that.
07:14But often when you come back from a long-term injury and all of a sudden you're exposed to the sort of rigours of full-time football in the championship, those things do happen.
07:23I know you updated us on the sort of transfer situation last night.
07:26I just asked you, are you looking for another striker, perhaps a backup striker specifically?
07:30That's not a priority for us at the moment.
07:32I think we've obviously got Colby and Tom. We have operated with three centre-forwards in the past and more last season when Colby had his heart surgery.
07:41So it's a potential area, I think, to strengthen, but definitely not a priority.
07:48And we're really pleased with where Colby's at, despite him not being able to train at the moment, but there's nothing to worry about.
07:54And we're really pleased with where Tom's at as well.
07:55You saw tonight that he's sharp and, you know, picked up where he left off last season with a positive performance against Coventry and that goal against West Brom.
08:02So can I push you on? Where are the priorities at the moment?
08:05I think there's sort of a couple of obvious gaps at the top end of the pitch on the right.
08:14So that would definitely be an area that I think we'd probably look to strengthen in.
08:18And, you know, we spoke about Zach and Terry filling in the middle of the park.
