Wolfsburg-Portsmouth: Crunch Time For Pompey

I'm going to go ahead and say this outright: Thursday's UEFA Cup tie between Wolfsburg and Portsmouth is going to be the deciding match for the English side on whether they'll be joining AC Milan and Wolfsburg in the next round of the competition.

Wolfsburg are going to prove a stern test for Pompey, who come off the back of an overall strong performance against AC Milan, and an absolute whipping by Portugeuse side Braga.

While I had originally expected us to nick a results against Braga, it just wasn't to be, but I was only ever hopeful of earning a draw against Milan. I still expect us to beat Heerenveen in our final group game, but what happens against Wolfsburg will be the decider.

Wolfsburg only need—at most—one point to assure that they will be going through to the next round, and I am hopeful that Portsmouth will be able to use the confidence from the Milan performances and Sunday's performance at Blackburn to lift them at the Volkswagon Arena.

Portsmouth will almost certainly have strikers Jermain Defoe and Peter Crouch leading the line against the German side, and both players having scored goals on Sunday will have done well for their confidence pre-match.

In addition, both wing-backs Glen Johnson and Nadir Belhadj have been on top of their game, as their creativity and width will be needed. In the midfield, Niko Kranjcar has declared himself fit to play, and I expect manager Tony Adams to recall the Croat.

But most importantly for the English side will be the overall squad performance, as a lack of concentration for the full ninety minutes has almost been their undoing on multiple occasions.

Fulham, Wigan, Hull, Milan, and Blackburn have all scored late goals with the team drawing the match in all of those games save one. That lack of concentration has cost us valuable points in the league. Hopefully for Thursday, things will be righted.

Wolfsburg will not be an easy task, as their position in the competition already suggests, and with World Cup winning right-back Christian Zaccardo among the players set to line up against Pompey.

Concentration will be key, but I feel that this game is very much "crunch time" for Portsmouth. A win here, and I'll be confident of our progression in the competition. A loss or a draw, and I feel that going any farther will be out of our grasp, barring any sudden run of good luck (which I doubt!).

Anything less than a win, I fear, just won't be good enough.