Gillingham (3) 2-2 (2) Portsmouth (AET) - Report

Well that was fun while it lasted!

Tonight we crashed out of the Carling Cup at the hands of League 1 side Gillingham.

This performance by a near full strength side will raise major concerns with all Pompey fans. The team lacked effort, lacked heart and most of all lacked the desire to play for the Pompey shirt. Was this the result of signing 19 different nationalities? Were these players not up for a hard fight against lower league opposition on a cold September evening?

The fans at the end made their feelings clear by beating their chests and shouting abuse towards the team and management. Those fans deserve all the credit in the world of making the 200 mile round trip for a not very glamorous midweek cup tie.

So were did it all go wrong?

Any ideas that Pompey were going to treat this competition as second rate were quickly put to bed as Alain Perrin sent out a near full-strength side against League 1 opposition.

With this strong line up, we started the game ok and took the lead on 24 minutes with a quick break away. Andy O'Brien's long ball up field was perfect for Dario Silva to latch onto. He laid the ball back to an unmarked Gary O'Neil, who hammered the ball into the top corner of the net.

This should have enabled us to take the heat out of the game and control the tempo - let our supposable Premiership class shine through.

Instead of this, the rest of the half was a scrappy affair with both sides guilty of giving the ball away, but Pompey's lead looked comfortable until a comical misunderstanding between Ashdown and Taylor gifted Gillingham an equaliser.

Ashdown rolled the ball out to Taylor but the defender was unaware of the impending Darren Byfield who was re-entering the pitch after going off injured. Byfield stole the ball in front of Taylor and smashed it past Ashdown into the bottom corner.

We then made the ideal start to the second half. In the 48th minute O'Neil ran from deep with the ball and when he attempted to poke the ball home after Jason Brown blocked his shot he was fouled by Sancho and Matthew Taylor emphatically converted the penalty.

Six minutes later it all started to go wrong for Pompey. The impressive Darren Byfield worked some space and shot towards goal. His low drive struck diving Jamie Ashdown's right-hand post but then rebounded onto the back of the keeper's head before spinning over the line.

With time running down Pompey were gifted a golden chance to seal the game when a sweeping move sent Todorov clear. His tumble as Sancho tackled him looked dramatic, but the referee awarded a penalty only for the Bulgarian to fire the spot kick well wide.

Unlike the previous two halves, Pompey started extra time poorly and Gillingham looked to ram home their advantage. After a spell of sustained pressure the home side took the lead when Chapman got to the by line and crossed for Andrew Crofts in the 94th minute to coolly fire home from ten yards.

For the rest of extra time, we lacked a spark and never looked like scoring.

This ended a very short and disappointing league cup game for Pompey.


wanc.co.uk's Pompey Man of the Match: Gary O'Neil

In short, we gave Gillingham too much respect. We needed to go out there and dominate the game and make Gillingham work for this victory. We lacked a goal scorer. Fans moaned that Yakubu was lazy, but he did something Karadas and Silva can't - score goals!

Let's hope the same team can pull off a shock result on Saturday when we play away at Bolton.

The last line I will leave to the victorious Gillingham fans - "Premier League, your having a laugh" - based on this performance, I tend to agree!