THE LAND OF THE FREE AND THE HOME OF THE UNSCHEDULED 42-HOUR STOPOVER

BP might be suffering from bad PR at the moment, but if news of Portsmouth's pre-season tour of North America is anything to go by, woes prompted by photos of disconsolate and dead-looking sludge-soaked brown pelicans could soon be eclipsed by those of another well-known oil retailer.

Pompey's website proudly informs visitors that their away travel is "fuelled by Texaco", who everyone who is anyone in the petroleum industry is aware, are the official motor fuel partner of the npower Championship. Whether Texaco's remit stretches to fuelling Portsmouth's travels beyond the Championship's boundaries remains unknown. If it doesn't, their public relations wing could do worse than rattle off a short press release completely disassociating themselves from an expedition so beset by misfortune it makes Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic expedition seem like a fun-filled weekend jolly for the lads.

Relegated, potless and still very much in administration, the very fact that Portsmouth's budget stretched to a pre-season tour of anywhere more exotic than the Winchester bypass is surprising. But led by new manager Steve Cotterill, the club's two-week trip to USA! USA!! USA!!! and Canada concluded yesterday when a team comprised of trialists, youth-team players and a clatter of their few remaining registered first-team players were whipped 4-0 by DC United. It was the high point of the kind of bad trip that gives LSD a bad name, if only because it marked its end.

Luckless Pompey's problems began a fortnight ago when a cancelled connecting flight meant a journey to San Diego ended up taking 42 hours. Travelling on to Canada, two players had to be sent home with knack, including suspected leg-snap for goalkeeper Jon Stewart, who as it turned out, was one of the lucky ones. The remaining players and backroom staff found themselves stranded in Chicago when a storm grounded their flight from Edmonton to Washington, which meant the players arrived for Saturday's match with DC United having had just four hours' sleep and lost 14 items of luggage, including their kit. The final indignity? Having to wear the away strip of their hosts as they had their backsides handed to them by Major League Soccerball opponents in a bad-tempered 'friendly' played in temperatures so sweltering the referee very considerately sent three players, including Hayden Mullins, off to cool down.

"The one thing about this result is that it's shown the position we're in. It's painful," said Cotterill who, to be fair, probably hadn't envisaged a future in which glitter and candyfloss featured prominently when he agreed to take the job. "We've got some good honest senior lads here and some youngsters who are trying their hardest. The kids have got to be at full tilt to be anywhere near the team and we're going to be playing in a man's league in a couple of weeks' time."

In poker, a player on 'full tilt' plays with wreckless and ill-advised abandon after suffering bad setbacks. While this may well be the reaction Cotterill gets from his younger players, the Fiver suspects it's not quite the definition of the term he had in mind.

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Posted By: Ralf Scrampton on July 26th 2010 at 16:04:30

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