Chapter 1: What recent transfer news is impacting Portsmouth's player acquisitions?
The latest Pompey news updates every day from the Pompey Sound News Desk.
This transfer story is from Sports Witness. Portsmouth are in the race to sign Gornik Zabri's Ousmane Sow in the winter market. That's according to Majaiki.pl, who report on interest from the Championship club, Brondby IF and Victoria Plozen interest in the 25-year-old. Gornik Zabri took the winger from Lies SK in February 2025.
He's impressed so far, scoring nine goals and contributing three assists from 19 matches this season. Taking his performances into account, Maciejki.pl say it's no surprise clubs ask about him. Portsmouth and Victoria-Pleizen have both shown interest in the Senegalese attacker.
He can leave the Polish club in this window, however the report states the attacker has discarded the option of joining John Mazzino's side. The Championship club are currently 21st in the table, a point above 22nd-placed Norwich City, with two games in hand.
According to the outlet, Sow isn't impressed by Portsmouth's current sporting situation, therefore, he isn't keen on joining the English club. Bromby could end up winning the transfer race after making multiple offers, the last one around €3m plus bonuses. This is, irresistible, for Gornik Zabrzej, who have to raise funds due to a lack of financial support from their owner.
McAkee.pl claim it's matter of days before Sow leaves his current club. However, it's unlikely he'll move to Portsmouth in January.
Two or three things on this story. One, I don't think many of us have given a great deal of thought to the fairly obvious fact that with Pompey down towards the relegation zone, one or two players and their people, their agency, might say it's not a good idea to go there because you could end up being relegated and that wouldn't do your market value any good.
And it wouldn't do your profile any good. So think about a club that's higher up in the league than, say, 20th, 21st, 19th, which is round about where we are. The second thing, of course, is that the club's doing all it can to steer clear, to rise above, to get away from the relegation zone. So there's nothing more that they can do than they aren't already doing to achieve that.
And the third thing that's worth mentioning reminding ourselves about, as far as this story is concerned, is it might be all hot air designed to increase the transfer value of the player in question. And I suppose, finally, fourth thing, would we be paying £3 million for a striker? It doesn't seem likely.
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Chapter 2: Why is Ousmane Sow hesitant to join Portsmouth despite interest?
He seemed off to a flying start. Since then he's played just over 100 minutes for Pompey in a total of nine appearances, spread out over a span of time due to a number of niggling injuries.
Our records show that John Massinio commended Waddingham's competitive attitude during training, saying that Thomas tries his hardest every minute of every day on the training ground, and covering every blade of grass. However the Pompey head coach warned him about over-stretching, especially as the Championship is a demanding and bruising environment.
His glaring absences from the team and even the substitute bench is doubly confusing, since Pompey's need for a goalscorer has arguably never been greater in recent times. Fans and commentators note his track record as a young teenager in Australian top league football scoring 11 goals in 34 appearances for Brisbane Raw.
He only managed five appearances for Pompey with one goal in his first season, and only four appearances this season with no goals. It's a set of circumstances that lead to a suspicion that all may not be well with the youngster, and it will be interesting to see whether Pompey retain his services for the rest of the season, or allow him to go out on loan and gain valuable experience elsewhere.
It has to be said that it's understandable that there is speculation amongst some fans on social media. What they're saying is that the Australian, they're calling it an experiment, doesn't seem to be working. And we are deprived of, have been deprived of the services of our Australian contingent for a disproportionately large amount of time. There's no question about that.
However, different reasons in each of the cases, entirely authentic injuries which have to be dealt with. There is the possibility that the players themselves have been trying too hard in training, were trying too hard when they were on the pitch.
or just found the whole business of stepping up a grade into the championship from wherever they were playing in Australia is just a bit of a bridge too far, especially when you're young and your system is still quite... I'm not going to say soft. There's no such thing as a soft Australian.
But you're not as battle-scarred and as bruised and able to... Scarred is probably the word, with the rough and tumble of the championship. And so what would be a knock or a slight strain turns into something a little bit more serious. However, we have had, to my knowledge...
We have had no updates on a likely return date for Thomas Waddingham or whether he is not appearing because of injury or because he's got work to do. And of course, a large amount of that knowledge belongs to Waddingham himself. And it would be intrusive of the club to make announcements about his well-being one way or another.
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