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Grant slams Pompey owner

Avram Grant says he has been let down by the Portsmouth hierarchy © Getty Images

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Portsmouth boss Avram Grant has hit out at the 'broken promises' which have left his side staring Premier League relegation in the face.

Grant took over as manager when Paul Hart was sacked in November and was led to believe he would be in a position to add four new players to his side last month. But with the club struggling to pay their players for the fourth time this term, and needing to sell Younes Kaboul and Asmir Begovic to balance the books, Pompey have only been able to recruit striker Quincy Owusu-Abeyie on loan.

And Grant admits owner Ali Al-Faraj's failure to deliver the new blood he needed during the transfer window has hurt their hopes of survival.

''I'm not a quitter and I'm not afraid of problems - for me a problem is a big challenge and I came here with a big challenge,'' he said. ''But I'm very, very disappointed with the situation off the pitch and I'm very disappointed that people cannot do what they promised me.

''When I came to the team, I knew the situation was not good with the football side, but they promised me everything was good with the financial side and that we would bring four players more.

''So we made a lot of progress on the football side. We took points and the team played good football - not worse than the teams in 10th or even eighth place. We showed a lot of character and were thinking about the next step - to stay in the league.

''We needed to bring in players so that the squad could be good, especially as we had a lot of injuries in the team. There was a lot of pressure on a very short squad and we didn't have time to let players who were coming back from injury ease their way back into the squad.

''We've had injuries, as we thought we would have, and instead of bringing in two players, we sold two players. I'm very disappointed.''

While Storrie admitted last week that he and Grant had every reason to consider their positions, the Pompey boss has much greater concerns than his own future.

''I'm trying not to think about myself now, especially when we have a game on Wednesday. I'm trying to think about the club because I don't think that I'm the main issue,'' he said. ''The main issue is Portsmouth Football Club and the fans. I'm trying to think what is best for them. Of course, I don't feel we did the best for them off the pitch. But on the pitch, we are always trying to do the best and I'm only thinking about the game.''

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