Kranjcar tipped for 'shock' return/Primus - 'PTID'

Bilic feels Kranjcar 'could' play again this season...

According to a 'report' on setanta sports Slaven Bilic, if only he would come here in the summer, believes that Niko Kranjcar could make a 'shock return' from injury to play a part for us before the season ends?

The Croatian manager, who will of course have more than one eye on the player with World Cup qualifiers coming up early in June, says that he is 'recovering at a rapid pace' and 'will start running this week' before also going onto say 'he may actually play for Portsmouth in their final game of the season against Wigan on May 23'... we do not actually play until 24th May, so that is another day to recover :-)

We have already seen this season that Kranjcar can recover from injury sooner than we expect, as he has already made at least one early return from injury but this injury was thought to be a particularly nasty one that would sideline him for some time?

Either Bilic is wrong in his assessment of him or some at Pompey are not being as 'accurate' with what our assessments of him is, as we were told he would not be fit until the start of pre-season in July...

The cynic in me says that he may well be fitter than we let on, but we are not going to take any chances on him as we cannot sell an injured player... But putting aside these 'cynical views' the way they are put across, what I do know is we are not going to take any risks on him as we will not want to make any injury any worse in case this does affects the chances of being able to offload him this summer! Should we not deem him fit, but Croatia did not long after the season ended then this would seem 'strange' though.

'If' safety is assured before the Wigan game, even if he is fit enough I would be amazed if we took a risk on him, 'if' we still needed to win that game and he is fit we would be more tempted, but even then I cannot see that many risks being taken?

Time will tell I guess...

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Primus on being 'Pompey til I die! '

When some people say that they are 'Pompey til I die' you want to believe them, at times when people have said this in the past, maybe foolishly, you did believe them but they then let you down and ran off when the going was good for them, but not so for them at Pompey... They may as well have turned round and spat in your face, as that is what they did!

When Linvoy Primus says he wants to be 'Pompey til I die' you do believe it, and the only fear is that he will not be given this chance...

A contract is apparently waiting for him, quite what this contract is for is unknown - is it a playing contact, a coaching, or both? Is it even related to the playing or coaching side of things anyway? What is certain is Linvoy wants to stick around for the long term and is hinting at this being an 'ambassadorial role' down the line, but all will become clear when our future is confirmed.

I suspect, stay up or not, that we will offering him a playing contract for next season - that takes him through to his testimonial, he then retires and takes his ambassadorial role. I do not think that he will play much in the 1st team next season and this will be more in a reserve role to help out others coming through, but with Linvoy you can never say never...

Whatever happens though Linvoy will be Pompey til he dies, and if we do not keep him connected to the club in some form or capacity in the future it is criminal - sentimentality has gone out of the window these days, but I still feel that this has not disappeared for us as a club with him, history speaks for itself with him on that score.

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