Portsmouth skipper Clark Robertson apologises to Blues fans after Charlton thrashing

The Pompey skipper has also put out a strong rally cry, admitting his side must return to winning ways quickly if they want to achieve promotion this season.

The Blues put on a dismal showing at The Valley as they fell to a 3-0 defeat to the Addicks.

Despite controlling the opening stages of the contest, Ryan Inniss’ 17th minute header put Ben Garner’s side in the ascendancy with Danny Cowley’s men unable to respond.

Indeed, their evening was made even more difficult when Corey Blackett-Taylor doubled the Reds’ advantage before Marlon Pack was sent off early in the second half.

Charlton were able to capitalise on the extra man and quickly found a third from a second set piece, something which angered Robertson.

Although the contest was moved to a Monday evening, 2,743 Pompey fans made the trip to south London and the Blues skipper has offered his apology for his side’s display.

The defender admitted his team were too soft and showed little quality after falling behind and didn’t do enough to be rewarded in the game.

He told The News: ‘I felt we had a good way into the game first five ten minutes and conceded another set piece and we've already conceded far too many set pieces this season.

‘We’ve got a big team and we’re too soft, not even in general play we’re too soft. We didn’t win second balls, we didn’t win tackles, we didn’t win enough headers, we didn’t compete well enough and if you don’t do that you won’t be able to show your quality in the game.

‘We do have good players but if you don’t win the battle in this league you won’t win the games.

‘We came into this game confident, we wanted to put on a show for the 2,000 fans that travelled here in their numbers and the support is always amazing so we can only apologise.

‘It wasn’t good enough, they spent their hard-earned money to come and watch that tonight and it was far from good enough from us tonight.’

The thrashing extends Pompey’s run to four games without a win in the league, which also sees them slip to fifth in the table.

Robertson admits his side should not feel sorry for themselves and has called in his team to bounce-back quickly if they want to achieve promotion.He added: ‘We’re obviously all down, we let the fans down and there were a few words said that I won’t say but we need to recover quickly.

‘You can’t feel sorry for yourselves in this league, you need to pick yourself up and we need to start winning games again and we need to do that quickly.’