Pompey 1 York 1: Highs, lows - and hard work ahead
Saturday, 2nd May 2015 21:59 by Steve Bone at Fratton Park

IN A way, Pompey’s final game summed up their whole campaign. It contained plenty of positives, but ended disappointingly.

Their second-half performance was, at times, as fluent as any football we have seen from them this season. They could easily have been three or four up by the time Matt Tubbs finally put them ahead with just seven minutes left.

The fact they weren’t out of sight was down to the woodwork and some excellent saves by York stopper Bobby Olejnik. But he couldn’t do anything to keep out Tubbs’ crisply-struck shot from outside the area following a ball to feet by Danny Hollands with seven minutes left. The strike confirmed Tubbs as League Two’s top scorer for the season, and let’s hope it’s the first of two such awards in a row.

The goal had Fratton Park rocking, though in fairness the atmosphere had been fairly upbeat all afternoon. This appeared to be a crowd who had largely put the disappointment of an under-achieving season to one side and had come to see the team off for the summer with hope in the heart that next season really will see an overdue proper promotion push.

Even so, there was an air of inevitability that the feelgood factor from the goal would fall flat. As has happened too often this season, Pompey proved unable to protect a lead. York had hardly peppered Paul Jones’ goal all afternoon — he’s barely had a save to make — but he was helpless to keep out Brad Halliday’s low shot after Dan Butler had been beaten in the box.

So it was one point instead of three, and you couldn’t help wondering where Pompey would have finished if each game where victory had turned into a draw in a similar way to this had ended differently.

It’s worth noting how fine, relatively, was the margin between where Pompey finished and where they’d have liked to. They ended up 14 points behind Plymouth, who were seventh and are now looking forward to a play-off semi-final, but lost only two games more than the men from Home Park, 17 to 15. Turn six of Pompey’s draws into wins, and three defeats into draws and we’d have ended up a point ahead of Plymouth.

That may be a futile argument now — after all the season is over and we didn’t save enough games or turn mediocre results into acceptable ones — but it does show again, and I’ve been saying this all season, that you don’t have to be brilliant, or even particularly consistent, to push for the prize at this level.

So have we learned our lessons, and can we get into that top seven, or even the top three, in 2015-16? Well without knowing who the manager is going to be, or which players are coming in or going out, it’s impossible to make even a reasonable guess at this stage. But there are some good signs.

The spine of the team looks pretty strong. Paul Jones, Paul Robinson, James Dunne, Matt Tubbs. They’re not a bad foursome to pencil into the starting line-up, but then again we’ve had them in the side this season, which would suggest the key will be not just them but who populates the team around them.

The youngsters we have seen recently — Ben Close in midfield and Conor Chaplin up front — do, although it is early days for both, look the part. Small in stature, big in heart and energy, both of them. And not everyone will agree with me but I happen to think another duo who are ahead of those two in their Pompey development, Dan Butler and Adam Webster, are two we must keep faith in and make regulars in the XI.

Clearly we will need additions in quality in all areas of the pitch — an experienced second-choice keeper, perhaps; two or three defenders, two or three for the midfield and another two strikers. That many, I suggest, because a fair few from the present squad will surely be nowhere to be seen come pre-season.

The big question to be answered is: Will Jed Wallace be part of the 15-16 plans? Increasingly it seems not, yet nothing is certain.

Allow me to add a little tale to what you already know of Wallace’s last-day on-field contribution, which saw him drive Pompey on as well as ever and create numerous chances for others, being denied another super goal by a post.

My son is a huge Wallace fan and was desperate to get his autograph after the game. He didn’t manage it during the players’ lap of appreciation so we took to hanging around behind the Fratton end after the game.

Player after player trooped through to the new car park, and I should say not one of them refused a single request for an autograph or a picture, which was fabulous to see at a club where even the recent past has seen certain players think they are above such interaction. Even Patrick Agyemang was there, getting a mixture of requests for a squiggle and puzzled looks.

It was getting on for 6.30pm and there was no sign of Wallace, with one club official telling us he’d gone. Then enquiries revealed he was in fact still around, and apparently giving a lengthy interview to The News’ Neil Allen (which will make very interesting reading).

When he emerged, there were a good few dozen fans still waiting for him and he stopped for every single one, whether they wanted an autograph, a photo, or just to ask him if he was leaving or to plead with him to stay. He greeted every inquiry with a smile and a response, giving his No8 shirt to one lucky young man before driving off into the evening, giving my son and I one last wave.

If that wave and those he gave the fans who stood to applaud him when substituted late on were the last he will give as a Pompey player, then it is a big loss to the club. He will leave a hole in the team that will be difficult if not impossible to fill with one player. But if the summer does see him move on to a team playing at a higher level — Championship clubs are apparently among those keen to take him — then he will surely do so with the good wishes of all Blues fans.

His efforts over two-and-a-half seasons in a Pompey shirt have been outstanding, and it would be lovely to think he might yet make it three-and-a-half and lead us to League One.

It could be that Wallace is still our player when our next new manager arrives, and if he is that will be the new man’s first job — either to keep Wallace at Fratton or set about how to overcome his absence. Good luck with that.

Next on the list of priorities for our fourth boss in less than two seasons will be how to turn mid-table Pompey into an outfit capable of promotion. If he wants to see a potted version of the 2014-15 campaign as he plots an improvement, he just needs to watch this York game back.

It will show him the good things Pompey can do, and the bad things too - from the waves of attacks that can be, and have been at times, too much for any League Two visitors, to the sloppy passes in their own half that can, and have at times, cost them so dear.

Pompey: Jones; Devera, Ertl, Webster, Butler; Dunne, Close, Wallace (Tarbuck 88), Hollands; Chaplin, Tubbs. Subs not used: Poke, May, Shorey, Fogden, Atangana, Westcarr.

Referee: Rob Lewis

Attendance: 17,254 (480 away fans)