Neville Dalton is a journalist and a Portsmouth fan of 45 years.
Relegation and near-disintegration of the club doesn’t really rank as one of the better seasons in the history of Portsmouth Football Club.
But there were highlights amid the despondency – in fact, probably because of that despondency.
As I return to my favourite theme – expectation, and what it does to fans’ perception and players’ perceived pressure to perform – I glimpse several positives among the obvious negatives.
The performances, by and large, were better than during the previous season, despite our relegation (due in no small part to the 10-point deduction).
They were certainly rather more entertaining.
And once Steve Cotterill left, the discipline improved considerably.
That’s not to discredit entirely Cotterill’s achievements, either last term or at the start of the season just ended.
He became the latest – though not the last – in a line of managers expected to operate under considerable constraints, and with precious little to look forward to.
He steered Pompey to mid-table mediocrity in his first season at Fratton, galvanising a bizarre mix of ex-Premier League players and inadequate loan signings sufficiently to at one stage offer hopes of a play-off place before subsiding to a more realistic mid-table position.
As I’ve said so many times, it was the way he overstepped that fine line between motivation and aggression that concerned me most, and sure enough Pompey’s ill-discipline in the first weeks of the last season under Cotterill was to reap its own consequences later, with suspensions compounding the usual injury crises in such a small squad.
Yet Steve Cotterill kept us up comfortably in that first season, only to jump surely before he was pushed to relegation rivals Nottingham Forest following a bad start to his second.
He left us with a pocketful of red and yellow cards and a battle against relegation. But he signed the likes of Erik Huseklepp and Marco Futacs, who were both to play their part in Pompey’s promising rally later in the season.
Under the caretaker stewardship of Guy Whittingham and Stuart Gray, not only did Pompey’s discipline improve (just five yellow cards in six games – the same number as Pompey picked up in their first match of the season against Middlesbrough), but so did their results – three wins in six compared with a similar number from their first 11 under Cotterill.
Appleton’s reign was actually not that much better than Cotterill’s in terms of points per game (1.0 compared with 0.82), but the performances were often considerably better, certainly after the arrival of Allan and Maguire.
And his willingness to play Huseklepp and Futacs, in whom Cotterill appeared not to have total confidence, reaped its own rewards.
Stand-out players
The subsequent emphasis on youth – fielding home-grown talent alongside willing and talented young loanees – was always going to buy him extra latitude from the Fratton Park faithful, and had the bonus of reintroducing pace and verve to many of Pompey’s performances in circumstances where we probably did not have the right to expect them.
So what were the highlights? Who were my stand-out players?
I know we all have different views, and none is more valid than another.
But my plus points included the 4-1 victory over Birmingham City, which followed such a miserable run of results and marked the start of Maguire’s most impressive performances; the 2-0 win over Hull a few days later that brought the prospect of a great escape tantalisingly closer, and even our 2-1 defeat to Derby in the final home game, where I thought the individual performances deserved greater reward than they received.
That’s not to forget a decent 1-0 win under Cotterill over eventual league winners Reading way back in August, a 3-1 win over Doncaster – the eventual wooden-spoonists – an impressive goalless draw at Crystal Palace a week later, and, of course, the slightly flattering 3-0 win over Cotterill’s new team, Nottingham Forest – all achieved under the caretaker managers.
Individually, Pompey fans were privileged to see some impressive and totally committed performances from a couple of players who surely are going to be Premier League stars and play key roles in Scotland’s future – Scott Allan and Chris Maguire – my choice as player of the season.
There were occasional glimpses of what the future might hold in mature displays from Adam Webster and Ashley Harris, still more promise from Futacs, and not forgetting an extremely impressive season from Tal Ben-Haim, who unfortunately will be resented for his salary rather than appreciated for his performances.
And there was the bonus of an outstanding first season from Jason Pearce.
Of course there were plenty of disappointments, too, not least the two sendings-off in the opening eight fixtures; the season-total of 86 yellow cards (only just behind the previous season’s shameful tally) and miserable home defeats to Ipswich, Middlesbrough, Millwall and, of course, Burnley.
Individually, I would regard David Norris’s overall season (not, though, his effort) and those of Dave Kitson, Kanu, Aaron Mokoena and Benjani as particularly disappointing.
Yet pluses must surely be the renaissance of Joel Ward under Appleton’s tutelage, turning a dreadfully disappointing first half of the season into one where the youngster exuded confidence, allying new levels of skill and heading ability to undoubted commitment and endeavour.
Only a marked lack of pace prevents him being a very good player at Championship level.
And what of our goalkeepers? Jamie Ashdown failed to impress me in the opening fixtures, but came back a different man after the departure of Stephen Henderson, matching the brilliant young Irishman with some of his sensational saves at the season’s end.
Plenty to dwell on, then, but plenty to look forward to.
If only we still have a club to follow.