Pompey 0 Newport County 3: Golf trip leads to Pompey falling

The Blues fell to a massively disappointing 3-0 defeat by Newport County to hurt their automatic promotions on Saturday.

The Exiles were good value for their victory with Paul Cook’s side ponderous in their play.

That was after devastating Accrington Stanley with arguably their best performance of the season last Tuesday.

Pompey never looked like repeating that display for a second at Fratton Park, however.

Newport boss, Feeney, told how his players undertook an unusual preparation for the game as they went on a golf day last week.

Feeney thanked his club for allowing that to happen and thinks the benefits of lightening the mood could be seen in their performance.

He told Clubcall.com: ‘Thank you to the club for the golf.

‘It’s all about wrapping the boys up in cotton wool now and not really training them.

‘Obviously you’ve got to do a little bit of light work here and there with the position we are in, but it’s about getting the boys together.

‘I’m big into work ethic, you could say team bonding, but I am keen to get the players together.

‘We had a good day on Thursday, but what worried me more was there may have been some better golfers than footballers!’

Paul Cook afforded Newport praise for the manner in which they went about getting their comprehensive victory.

Cook spoke of the congested midfield being a problem his players didn’t contend with.

Feeney, felt, however, it was the energy of his players which made a big difference.

And that vigour allowed the Exiles to hurt Pompey on the counter attack.

Feeney said: ‘If you look at our front four or five, they are full of legs. Whenever we go after the ball, we hit them on the counter-attack.’