Pack targets Championship stability for Portsmouth

Marlon Pack led Portsmouth to Championship survival in the 2024-25 season

Portsmouth club captain Marlon Pack said stabilising themselves in the Championship is the club's main aim going into the new season.

Pompey are preparing for the second campaign back in the division after a 12-season absence from the second tier.

John Mousinho's men finished 16th last season, five points above the bottom three, after they secured their survival with two matches remaining.

Pack told BBC Radio Solent: "We need to continue to stabilise in the Championship.

"Just because we had a good season last year [it] doesn't guarantee anything this year."

He added: "We can be positive but also need to be realistic because we're still in our infancy as a Championship football club.

"We've got players now that are a year more experienced, and lads that have played a lot of games now in the Championship. So, hopefully, that will go into this season and can feed in confidence and the positivity around the camp."

'We're in a good place after pre-season'

Mousinho's side have enjoyed an impressive, unbeaten pre-season, recording six wins and a draw in their seven games.

They also scored 17 times and did not concede a single goal, rounding off their warm-up matches with a 1-0 Fratton Park win against Dutch top-flight side PEC Zwolle.

Pack said: "I know we're in a good place as a team, as a squad. We've come back really fit, chomping at the bit.

"I've seen a huge improvement in the training and the deliberateness in the way we're going to go about things.

"That doesn't just translate straight away into the first game of the season. Sometimes it takes time.

"You don't want to look too much into pre-season results of course, but I think we're in a much better place, and it's just now down to us to translate that into performances and results."

Andre Dozzell scored Portsmouth's first goal at Oxford United in February

Portsmouth's 2025-26 campaign begins with a trip to Oxford United, who finished one place and one point behind them last term.

Their 2-0 win at the Kassam Stadium in February last season was Portsmouth's second Championship away victory of the season on the road and part of a late upturn in form in their ultimately successful bid to stay up.

"Oxford was a good turning point for us. We ended up then drawing them back into it and overtaking them," Pack said.

"They'll be a team that we will be competing with this year in relative terms to league position and probably our objective to stay in the division, so it will be a good marker for us even though it's only the first game of the season."