Can Albion take a big chance to build new confidence?
POMPEY CLASH SEES BOTH CLUBS STRIVING FOR FORM
SOMETHING has to give, you might think, when Burton Albion and Portsmouth face off at the Pirelli Stadium tonight (7.45pm).
It is a game between two clubs poles apart in terms of history and size but inextricably linked in terms of decidedly indifferent current form.
After three League One matches, Burton and Portsmouth shared top spot with a 100% record, the south coast side shading it by one on goal difference, while both had slipped out of the Carabao Cup at the first hurdle.
Arguably, Burton had shaded it in terms of scalps. Both had beaten Shrewsbury Town 1-0 but the Brewers had seen off Ipswich Town and Sunderland – bigger prizes than beating Fleetwood Town and Crewe Alexandra, as Pompey had done.
Since then, though, the record is three draws and three defeats apiece, six games without a win, seven if you throw in the Papa John’s Trophy.
Both clubs have highly thought of, modern managers, in Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink and Danny Cowley.
Where they differ is the levels of expectation.
While that of many Burton supporters may have been significantly raised by the return of Hasselbaink and the dramatic rise to League One safety last season, at Fratton Park it is more a story of wafer-thin patience and frustration.
When financial reality bit and they slipped out of the Premier League – the same year Burton were promoted to the Football League, 2008-09, they took only three more seasons to reach League Two.
Rescued, financially, they did not then expect to spend four seasons getting out of League Two and four more, so far, still in League One.
Kenny Jackett’s 211-game spell in charge, which ended last season, was by far the longest as managers came and went in search of the return to – at least – the Championship.
In Cowley, they probably have a man with the pedigree to deliver, if they give him enough time.
But the last six games will have created rumblings for Pompey, which will probably lead to a nervous game tonight.
Predicting games between the sides is not easy, either.
In nine matches, they have drawn four, Portsmouth have won three and Burton two.
The Brewers have been unfortunate to come away only with two 2-2 draws from Fratton Park and they won their, thrillingly, 2-1, on their last visit in April, when Joe Powell scored the goal of the season with a 35-yard shot.
Earlier in the campaign, though, Portsmouth had inflicted one of the more painful defeats in Jake Buxton’s time in charge, former Burton winger Marcus Harness scoring a quite brilliant hat-trick in a 4-2 win
at the Pirelli Stadium.
It was not the first game in which Harness has scored against his old side and they will certainly be wary of his threat again tonight.
What Hasselbaink will be telling his players, though, is that tonight is not about Harness, or Cowley, or Portsmouth’s history.
He knows and most supporters still believe that he has the squad to make an impact in League One this season.
Now it’s all about going out and proving it.