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'Building him up': Portsmouth boss outlines plans for unleashing Marko Milovanovic on the Championship The striker arrived at Fratton Park last month in a £3m deal from Almeria John Mousinho has outlined his plans to ensure Marko Milovanovic is unleashed on the Championship with maximum impact. The Serbian striker was handed 30 minutes in Tuesday afternoon’s behind-closed-doors friendly at Pompey’s training ground against Kuwait SC. Although he didn’t get on the scoresheet in the 2-0 success, it still represented an encouraging first outing in a Blues shirt since last month’s much-anticipated arrival. Mousinho had previously resisted utilising Milovanovic off the bench at Darmstadt, despite many of the 1,433 travelling faithful frequently calling for his introduction during the goalless draw. Instead Pompey’s head coach has been focused on ensuring the 23-year-old is firstly up to speed through pre-season training, before handing match action. And with 15 minutes now pencilled in against West Ham in the Carabao Cup on Saturday, Mousinho has Milovanovic’s path to the first-team carefully plotted. ‘We have to build him up’ He told The News: ‘I thought Marko was really good against Kuwait SC, he came close to scoring on two occasions, the goalkeeper made two good saves. ‘On another occasion, the centre-half would have been sent off for the challenge when Marko was through on goal - but we didn’t want it to go to a game where it was 11v10, so it was the right decision from the referee. ‘But he showed that movement in behind, he showed that physical threat, he showed the touches. I thought it was a really good start to Marko's time as a Pompey player. ‘It was only ever going to be 30 minutes. He’s not been in the building that long, we've had Marko for probably about 12 days, so this was the first time we wanted him to get that (game) exposure. ‘We didn't want him to do it at Darmstadt, but come this weekend he’s now had 30 minutes under his belt and it’s probably okay to play 15 minutes if available. ‘Normally coming back for pre-season, you’d maybe have an entire in-house friendly or a friendly like yesterday. Then, off the back of it, it would be 14-15 days with Marko with us and we’d probably be comfortable for him to play 15 minutes in competitive fixtures. ‘We have to build him up from that point, so it will be 15 minutes on Saturday, 30 minutes against QPR and 45 minutes after that. It’s just to build him up. ‘By the time we get him to play 60-plus minutes, it would be the equivalent of him having a 4-5 week pre-season, as we would expect of our players.’ Two goals in 11 minutes earn Pompey victory Substitutes Kyran Sylvanus and Nathaniel Chioma netted in the final 11 minutes to earn the Blues a 2-0 success over Kuwait SC in their final pre-season friendly. Milovanovic had started alongside fellow summer signings Eoin Kenny and Daniel Bielica, although was replaced on 30 minutes in a pre-arranged substitution. Now he’s expected to be on the bench for Saturday’s curtain raiser to the 2026-27 season, with Pompey heading to West Ham, where they will be roared on by 9,000 away followers. Mousinho added: ‘He’s had a summer of upheaval as well. He is a very sensible kid, you can see he’s very physical, so, because of his size, because of his power and his athleticism, we must make sure he doesn't break down. You have to look after him off the back of that. ‘I always found it difficult enough if you were moving from Stevenage to Burton, let alone if you’re a Serbian coming over from Portugal to England for the first time. So I think you have to be really conscious of that.’