That was certainly ‘a strange’ afternoon wasn’t it! A wins a win, and you take it, but it wasn’t – in my opinion – entirely convincing as such! Right?
You couldn’t really say we came under heavy pressure from Barnet but you wouldn’t have often known we were playing against 10-men when we were either would you as the sending off didn’t seem to make too much difference!
Still, very much, a ‘work in progress’ with Pompey isn’t it but you feel, well I do anyway, there’s still plenty more to come from this side with Leam Richardson of that opinion too when speaking to portsmouthfc.co.uk after the win.
Paul Cook’s no.2 was also pleased with the response to falling behind, as we did to an Andy Yiadom goal. Equalising through Conor Chaplin before Adam McGurk made the most of Barnet not ‘playing to the whistle’ when he was rightly onside, a decision Richardson also backed:
‘When some sides go behind that’s the way it stays, but our lads have got a fair bit of belief in themselves and our philosophy.
‘It was good officiating for our second. The linesman put his flag up for a guy who wasn’t interfering with play and it was an intelligent run from Adam who finished very well.
‘We got the result we wanted, but there is still plenty of work that needs to be done and we won’t get carried away.’
Chaplin, who should have had a hat-trick really as he missed a great chance in the 1st half before he did score, was one of two changes to the starting XI by Cook with Chaplin, with his two-goals, and McGurk both justifying selection you have to say?
On these two has also said:
‘In the short time I’ve known Conor, I’ve discovered that he’s a young lad who loves football and loves scoring goals.
‘The more he does that then the more the manager is going to pick him in the side.
‘He’s out there practicing on the training pitch every day and he’s got great technique as well.
‘It was his day, while Adam also came into the team and did very well, but it’s a squad game and we won’t get promoted with just 11 players.’
You can also listen to Richardson’s thoughts if you wish in this audio clip from ExpressFM.
Audio Clip used from AudioBoom – click here.
Like I say a wins a win and we probably did deserve to win but we’re still very much looking for the right combination and formation you feel?
Cookie’s favoured one seems better suited for games away from Fratton perhaps but not so much at home? Unless we get to a point that it’s abundant clear it’ll not work he’ll keep to it mind and, in fairness, he made modifications to it and changes during the game, going to three at the back for a while – that almost turned into a flat back five at times so taking off a central defender when we went ahead was definitely the right call.
We had another terrible ref again you’ve got to say, they seem to lose control and end up dishing out strange yellow cards but if they stamped out some heavy treatment from those coming to Fratton early on with yellow cards it might make people think twice about such an over physical approach!
The Barnet goalie, who got a second yellow cards to add to his 1st half one for ‘time wasting’ might think twice about doing that again too – not that the ref would have ever booked him again for continued time wasting would he…then again had it not been booked his sending off surely would have been a straight red and not the second bookable offence he went for!
Another free midweek before back-to-back away games at Oxford and Bristol Rovers isn’t a bad thing, another couple of tests but another couple of games for us to show we mean business and with our set up, like I’ve said, seemingly looking better for away games I’m hopeful of a positive points return from them…
PLAY UP POMPEY!
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