Nicky Shorey has told his Pompey team-mates they can't afford 'flat' periods in games to last as long as 45 minutes.

The defender was disappointed with how long Pompey took to get going against Mansfield at Fratton. He felt they could have won it after their late-game dominance.

Shorey told The News: ‘I think we can play better, definitely, there is a lot more in the tank. There have been bursts here and there where we have shown our ability.

‘On Saturday, in the last 25 minutes, we showed the quality we possess and power we have got — but we need to show that more in games and for a longer period. We need to start putting it together for a proper performance for a whole game.

‘Sometimes it is good enough to do that for 20 minutes to win the game but at the minute we are finding it a little bit difficult. Probably looking at it, Mansfield will be saying they deserved a draw. I just feel the pressure we had in the last half-an-hour, we should have won it.

‘It started pretty average and got increasingly better towards the end of the game and I think we were happy with the last section of it, without a doubt. If we play like that for most of the games I don’t think we will have a problem.

‘But the first half was flat, sometimes that is the way it goes in football, you can’t be on top form all the time. We need to find a way to shake ourselves out of it — 45 minutes is too long to be flat.

‘Obviously the opposition will be happy with that but being at home we need to spark the fans into life.’

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