John Mousinho: Portsmouth boss hails 'blistering start' at Barnsley
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Portsmouth celebrating their third goal against Barnsley at Oakwell
Portsmouth boss John Mousinho says his side's dominant first-half performance sealed the win over Barnsley to send them top of League One.
Pompey scored twice inside the game's opening eight minutes and tacked on a third shortly after to take an early 3-0 lead at Oakwell.
"It was a blistering start," Mousinho told BBC Radio Solent.
"Probably the best we've started and the best opening 45 minutes since I've been in charge.
"We pressed really aggressively, really high, and we made really good decisions off the back of that.
"Some of the football and the bravery on the ball, the ability to break the lines and find runners going forward, was excellent and a joy to see.
"We seemed to have a lot of energy and the only criticism I have was we probably should have had four or five goals at half-time."
Second half: 'We didn't have the same energy'
Portsmouth came undone in the second half and conceded a goal four minutes after the break and a second in the 77th minute.
"The second half was absolutely awful to be honest," added Mousinho.
"We went from the best 45 minutes since I've been here to one of the worst second halves.
"It was a culmination of things; Barnsley brought on new players and changed their system and I think we just started to make some really poor decisions.
"All of a sudden the players' touch wasn't there and we gave the ball away on the wrong side.
"More disappointingly, we weren't tracking runners and we were diving in. We didn't have the same energy."
Injury updates on Ogilvie, Raggett and Saydee
The Blues managed to hang on for victory against last year's League One play-off finalists and claimed all three points to jump to the top of the League One table.
"My nerves at the end were awful," said Mousinho.
"When the second goal went in it was a case of digging in and hanging on.
"We had a very young team out there at the end so credit to the lads for seeing the game out."
Portsmouth centre-back Connor Ogilvie - who scored the third goal - left the field injured in the second half and fellow central defender Sean Raggett travelled with the team but didn't feature in the squad due to injury.
"With Connor I think it is a slight groin injury but nothing too bad," Mousinho said.
"Raggett was struggling with a foot problem in warm-up on Saturday and whilst he said tonight [versus Barnsley] he was fully willing to do the last 10 minutes of the game if needed, I think he was trying to do the right thing by the team, but not necessarily the right thing by him.
"We are going to need players like Sean, so we don't want him out for any longer than he needs to be, so it was right that he sat this one out.
"Christian Saydee, we weren't quite happy with him being up to full tilt, so it's really a case of making sure that we manage that and he doesn't break down. He is touch and go at the moment and we want to protect him."