One-nil to the Portsmouth, one-nil to the Portsmouth. That's what the Fratton End ought to have been singing - fittingly so on a day when a certain former Arsenal defender came back to a club for whom he lifted the FA Cup.
The Blues did not have the look of a 1-0 team in the first three months of the season. Before November 18, they'd won by that score only once in the league, at Gillingham. They had, mind you, lost by that score three times - including on successive Saturdays against Bradford and Luton.
But if 1-0 wins are the sign of a solid team, then Pompey have, in the past month, become a very solid one. They've won by that score three times at Fratton - against Southend, Plymouth and now Bury - and at Charlton last week. That's four times in five games.
The cynics might highlight that such a run of results suggest Pompey are not scoring too many goals and that will worry some. The more positive types among the Blues' support, not to mention their staff, will say it suggests you don't need to be scoring many - because you're not letting them in.
Four clean sheets in five games is impressive whatever your forwards are or are not doing at the other end. Managers will always, or almost always, be happier with a 1-0 win than a 4-3 triumph even if fans might feel a little starved of excitement.
We were certainly short of free-flowing football in this clash between a team in fine form and one trying to battle their way off the bottom of League One. It was one of those afternoons when most in royal blue couldn't help but think 'we should win this' when they turned up at a sunny but chilly Fratton Park. My experience of Pompey down the years is that when everyone turns up thinking they'll win, they usually don't. So you'll forgive me for my own pre-match nerves that it could well end up 0-0 or 0-1.
The first half was pretty much in line with those expectations: Pompey on top but not at their fluent best. Their attacking players had plenty of the ball - often Bury cleared from the edge of their own box straight to a blue shirt somewhere around the halfway line - but the final ball was largely disappointing.
Danny Rose - who once again, for me, was excellent, buzzing about everywhere and using the ball so sensibly and never wastefully - had the first half's best effort, a piledriver that swerved in the air and forced Leo Fasan into a good save.
Later in the half Gareth Evans had only Fasan to beat but was denied; then Jamal Lowe, lively all game but like too many of his team-mates just lacking that final bit of quality where it mattered, fizzed one just wide. At other times players worked themselves into great shooting positions but didn't shoot.
The man of the first half was Matt Clarke, impressive in defence and showing himself capable of marauding runs forward that you were dying to see end with a rocket of a shot from 20 or 25 yards fly into the top corner but which were stopped just short of such a magical finale.
And if he'd had a great first half, he had an even better second... with more hard work at the back alongside Christian Burgess as Bury's forays forwards were comfortably repelled plus the small matter of the winning goal. In truth, Clarke couldn't miss by the time Evans' corner from the Pompey left reached him, having been missed by the keeper and a couple of defenders, but credit Clarke with a perfectly-timed run to take advantage of the chance.
It long felt like a game in which one goal would be enough and so it proved. Bury never looked very likely to equalise although a couple of late free-kicks in dangerous areas would have been more worrying had their forwards shown much capability in the box before that point. Equally Pompey never looked particularly deserving of going on to make it three or four.
So it's seven wins in eight if you include the Football League Trophy or five from six in the league since the end of October. Pompey are seventh, level on points and goal difference with sixth-placed Charlton, a position that would have exceeded most fans' hopes at the start of the seaon and probably all supporters' expectations six or eight weeks ago.
Kenny Jackett has moulded a strong team and it's not just that - it's a strong squad too. There are decent players not getting into the starting XI and if the manager and his staff can get everyone fit, the competition for places will be fierce.
Against Bury, Clarke, his fellow members of the back and Rose were the stand-out performers, with Evans not far behind them.
Kyle Bennett had the sort of afternoon that Kyle Bennett can have - trying to make things happen but seeing them fail to come off on a regular basis. But let's face it - if he was as good every week as he can be, he wouldn't be playing in League One. Brett Pitman had a day to forget too - little fell for him and when it did, towards the end, he sent a shot horribly high over the bar.
Such frustrations over star players don't matter too much when your team win and right now, we just have to enjoy the run we're on. There seems little prospect there'll be any relegation worries in the second half of the season - and every chance the play-offs will be within Pompey's sights as the weeks go by.
Two of the Blues' next four games are against sides in the bottom five but next up comes a visit to second-placed Shrewsbury. The way Pompey are tackling things at the moment, they'll fear neither type of challenge that awaits them either side of Christmas Day.
Apart from Clarke's goal and the final whistle, there was one other highlight - seeing Svetoslav Todorov back on the pitch he used to grace with his neat feet and vital goals. He got the ovation he deserved.
Sol Campbell, of course, was there too and there were enough people willing to forget his fallout with the club in their troubled financial times for a chorus of 'When Sol went up..' to ring out. Maybe not everyone approved of Campbell getting the red-carpet treatment ... but Campbell surely approved of seeing his old club grind out a 1-0 win.
Pompey: McGee; Thompson, Burgess, Clarke, Haunstrup; O’Keefe (Close 46), Rose; Evans, Bennett (Chaplin 60), Lowe; Pitman. Subs not used: Bass, Talbot, Donohue, Kennedy, Main.
Referee: John Brooks
Attendance: 17,549 (176 away fans)
by Steve Bone @stevebone1 on Twitter
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