Hughes grateful for Pompey board's 'show of faith'

Portsmouth sporting director Richard Hughes is hoping extra investment in the summer transfer window will help the club to "be really competitive" in the coming Championship season.

The Blues have already spent significant money, with up-front fees for Marko Milovanovic and Rocco Shein eclipsing Pompey's entire transfer budget last summer.

Pompey have also spent money on Eoin Kenny and goalkeeper Daniel Bielica - as well as being linked with a move for Hull City winger Abu Kamara, a player who would be expected to command a significant fee.

Hughes revealed this summer's recruitment drive is something he and boss John Mousinho have been pushing for from the club's owners, as they look to build on finishes of 16th and 18th since their return to the second tier two years ago.

"We're really pleased to have the backing of the board to be able to operate in this way," Hughes told BBC Radio Solent.

"Hopefully it gives us that ability to really be competitive this year, it's something me and John had really pushed for, the accountability and the pressure.

"Hopefully this is a show of faith from the board and ownership, for us to be able to strengthen the group and invest a significant amount of money."

Prior to Thursday's signing of Serbian striker Milovanovic from Spain, some Pompey fans had been growing frustrated, with the deal appearing to take a significant amount of time after the initial interest was reported.

Some drew comparisons to the signing of Shein and how that seemed to have a faster turnaround compared to the deal for Milovanovic which dragged out longer.

Hughes was keen to set the record straight, and explained the deal for the striker ended up being fairly difficult for the club to complete.

"There's different sets of rules depending on which country the players are coming from," Hughes said.

"Rocco (Shein) was slightly easier because of Estonia's place in the EU - getting the paperwork for him to be able to travel to the country and the signing process was straightforward.

"Whereas with Marco it was difficult - there was a longer process at the Serbian end to get what's called a tourist visa to come into the country.

"That's completely out of our and the British government's control so it's not anything that we can speed up the process on."

Hughes shared that it took a number of days just to get the green light for Milovanovic to travel to England.

"That process with Marco actually took four days for him to be able to get permission to fly," he added.

"That creates a big difference in terms of the timeframe of the deal, dealing with different embassies is out of our remit and out of our control to a degree so there's a little bit of waiting involved.

"We'd always like players in as early as possible to give John and the coaching staff the sort of maximum exposure and that ability to build up their fitness work.

"But when you're dealing with significant amounts of money and very complicated processes, it's prudent to make sure everything's aligned in the correct way to make sure there's nothing that you're going to stumble into later down the line."