West Ham star serenaded by Portsmoush fans as transfer 'fiasco' looms

Portsmouth supporters serenaded West Ham midfielder Freddie Potts as he completed a lap of the Fratton Park pitch with his teammates following the end of the Championship season on Saturday.

The south coast side finished the season with a 1-1 draw against Hull City and placed 16th in their first campaign back in the second tier. Potts has been a key figure for John Mousinho this season and played 72 minutes on Saturday.

In total, Potts has racked up over 3,000 Championship minutes this season with one goal and four assists from defensive midfield. He started all of Portsmouth’s last 11 Championship matches.

Portsmouth fans share love for West Ham loanee Freddie Potts

After the match, the Portsmouth first team applauded their fans with the Fratton Park faithful aiming one particular song at the Hammers midfielder. “One more year, one more year, Freddie Potts, one more year, one more year, I say,” fans chanted as Potts could be seen smirking and applauding before tapping his heart.

The midfielder is now due to return to the London Stadium following his loan but a transfer fiasco could be on the horizon with both Portsmouth wanting the player back and Potter wanting time to work with the 21-year-old.

Potts signed a new contract deal with West Ham in March, making a temporary return to London to put pen to paper as he continued his loan spell at Fratton Park. That would suggest that the star is part of the long term plan at London Stadium.

Speaking about the player at the end of March, Potter said: “Freddie has had a couple of really good loans, successful loans, which I think is important for a player, at Wycombe and now at Portsmouth. It’s really important to have that accumulation of games, those minutes.

“We do a great job in terms of the Academy and development and have a good programme internally, but sometimes you need to go out and play as well and he’s done that and he’s had the benefit of that. So we’re looking forward to him finishing the season off strong and then coming back and being part of our group in pre-season.”

Portsmouth confident of bringing Potts back to Fratton Park

Those words strongly point towards Potter planning on using the player next term, but Portsmouth boss John Mousinho has also been confident that Potts could return to Fratton Park. Speaking to The News, when asked if Portsmouth could sign Potts again, Mousinho said: “I think so. Hopefully we’ve shown over the past couple of seasons to clubs higher up the pyramid that we’re a good club to loan players to.

“There are some loans which have worked out and some that haven’t, but any player who comes in if they are good enough to play will play. Age isn’t a thing that we’re particularly concerned about, Freddie is a prime example of that - Abu and Robbo were last year. We want good players in who can play at the level - and Freddie is certainly one of them.”

Other than signing his West Ham contract, Potts has previously admitted that he has developed ‘true feelings for Portsmouth and added that returning next season was ‘not my decision to make’. Potts also promised to ‘give it my all at West Ham during pre-season’.

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