A giant-killing could be in the offing when King’s Lynn Town head to Fratton Park to take on Portsmouth in the Emirates FA Cup 2nd Round. 

Portsmouth are currently on a three-match unbeaten run in all competitions and come into this one following a 1-1 draw at home with Oxford United on Tuesday night. Defender Sean Raggett opened the scoring for Pompey but a penalty from Alex Rodriguez midway through the second half earned Oxford a share of the spoils. 

King’s Lynn Town come into this mouth-watering cup tie following back to back wins against Barnet and a ten-man Dover Athletic. The latter came last Saturday and was a convincing 2-0 win at home. 

Team News

Portsmouth manager Kenny Jackett has said he will be naming a strong side against Kings Lynn so expect minimal changes. The only player unavailable to Jackett is Michael Jacobs who is out injured. 

The Linnets will be without Kairo Mitchell who is cup-tied, but Kyle McFadden is available. Jordan Richards has recovered from injury, and striker Michael Gash hopes to be in the squad for the first time this season following a bout of illness. Aaron Jones is still out injured. 

Predicted Line-ups

Portsmouth: MacGillivray, Johnson, Whatmough, Raggett, Brown, Harness, Naylor, Cannon, Curtis, Harrison, Marquis

King’s Lynn Town: Smith, Loza, Carey, Mair, McAuley, Mitchell, Callan-McFadden, Kelly, Clunan, Barrows

View From The Dugouts

Portsmouth boss Jackett had this to say on the cup tie in his pre-match press conference: “Personally, I always like to try and get to the third round and draw one of the big boys, maybe a Premier League club.

That is the opportunity, but you have to come through different types of ties to do that. It’s a tough one. Ipswich away, we have come through that one. This one is a potential banana skin, both our attitude and quality is going to have to be spot-on on Saturday for us to get through and progress to the third round.”

Town Boss Ian Culverhouse knows the enormity of the task ahead of his Kings Lynn team saying: “It is going to be much the same, backs against the wall, They are going to have a lot of possession of the ball. 

We watched them against a really good Crewe side, and they demolished them, so we are under no illusions as to the task on front of us - it is going to be every hand to the pump and we need to be resolute in our defending.”

Ones To Watch

The one to watch out for tomorrow for Portsmouth is striker John Marquis. Marquis is Portsmouth’s top marksman this season with ten goals so far this season. Marquis has a superb finishing ability and won’t need many chances to hit the back of the Town net. Marquis is also great at holding up the ball and bringing others into play, which will help bring players like Ronan Curtis into play as well. 

The visiting man main is Adam Marriot. Marriot scored a decisive penalty last weekend and along with Jamar Loza is Town’s top scorer this season. It will very much be a back to wall kind of game for the Linnets tomorrow, and Marriot will have to take any chance he can. King’s Lynn won the last round 1-0 with only one shot on target in the whole game so a repeat of that efficiency will be welcome in East Anglia. 

Where to Watch 

Supporters will be able to watch the game on the BBC iPlayer platform as well as on BT Sport’s digital platforms. Kick-off on the south coast is at 3 pm GMT.