Preview: Portsmouth vs Cardiff City - prediction, team news, lineups

Portsmouth will be looking to record their first home win of the season when they take on Cardiff City in Saturday's Championship clash.

Meanwhile, the Bluebirds are still searching for their first win of the 2026-27 Championship campaign.

Match preview

Portsmouth have made a sluggish start to a third consecutive Championship season, having lost three of their opening four league games.

John Mousinho's side started out with a 3-1 home defeat against Queens Park Rangers before they came on the right side of the same scoreline in their away clash with Lincoln City.

Unfortunately for Portsmouth, any confidence built by that victory has been dented by back-to-back defeats against Bristol City and Derby County.

Tuesday's 2-0 home loss against the Rams extended Pompey's winless head-to-head run to 13 matches and leaves them searching for their first home points of the campaign.

With just three points to their name, Pompey are languishing in 21st place and just outside the drop zone on goal difference.

Portsmouth are looking to claim a second straight win in meetings with Cardiff City after prevailing by 2-1 in the most recent encounter at Fratton Park in February 2025.

Newly-promoted Cardiff are level on points with Portsmouth after drawing three and losing one of their first four Championship matches.

Brian Barry-Murphy's charges netted late in a 1-1 draw against Wrexham before they played out 2-2 scorelines against Derby County and Sheffield United.

Unfortunately for Cardiff, their unbeaten start to the season was ended by a narrow 2-1 loss to Queens Park Rangers in Wednesday's clash at Loftus Road.

Perry Ng struck in the 75th minute to halve QPR's advantage, but Cardiff failed in their quest to find a late leveller, falling to a defeat that extended their overall winless run to five competitive games since beating Swindon Town in the EFL Cup first round.

Cardiff have won six of their last eight competitive matches against Portsmouth, although five of those victories took place on home turf.

Their last victory at Fratton Park took place in August 2010 when an own goal and a Jay Bothroyd effort fired the Bluebirds to a 2-0 win in a game that saw Marlon Pack make his league debut for Portsmouth, before later going on to make 109 appearances for Cardiff between 2019 and 2022.

Portsmouth Championship form:

Portsmouth form (all competitions):

Cardiff City Championship form:

Cardiff City form (all competitions):

Team News

Portsmouth winger Josh Murphy is set for a further eight-week absence after the decision was made for him to undergo surgery for a groin injury.

Pompey’s injury list also features Connor Ogilvie, Mark Kosznovszky, Keshi Anderson, Franco Umeh and Thomas Waddingham.

Jayden Meghoma and Tyerese Shade are both available following their deadline-day arrivals, with the former in contention to start at left-back.

As for the visitors, Dylan Lawlor is taking part in light training, but he still has some way to go in his rehabilitation before he can return to action.

Cardiff are also without the defensive duo of Calum Chambers and Will Fish due to knee and hernia injuries respectively.

Krystian Bielik and Chris Willock are pushing for starting spots after featuring as half-time substitutes in midweek.

Portsmouth possible starting lineup:

Bielica; Devlin, Arthur, Shaughnessy, Meghoma; Pack, Shein; Kamara, Segecic, Kavuma-McQueen; Marezi

Cardiff City possible starting lineup:

Trott; Ng, Osho, Bagan, Scanlon; Robertson, Bielik; Tanner, Moylan, Willock; Salech

We say: Portsmouth 1-1 Cardiff City

Portsmouth will be desperate to avoid another disappointing result in front of their supporters, but we think they will have to settle for a draw against a Cardiff side that have drawn three of their first four games.

For data analysis of the most likely results, scorelines and more for this match please click here.