GRAHAM RIX has played down fears over his future as Portsmouth manager despite seeing his side slump dismally to their fourth defeat in five games at Gillingham.

Rumours have been rife for several months that Rix, left, would be shoved aside for director of football Harry Redknapp, but until recently results have been good.

This latest blip in form was watched by chairman Milan Mandaric, Redknapp and directors Terry Brady, Martin Murphy and Fred Dinenage. None of them could have been impressed by what they saw.

After the match Rix remained his normal resilient self saying: "As far as I am concerned I am here, the chairman has backed me and Harry is embarrassed by it all."

As for the match, which was a lack-lustre and unsatisfactory performance which Portsmouth deservedly lost 2-0, Rix said: "I was a bit disappointed to say the least.

"Having said that we had a bit of a blow before the game when Kevin Harper was decided to be too ill to play with the 'flu and that disrupted our plans.

"But we committed two errors and got punished for them and apart from that Yoshi hardly had a save to make.

"Our passing let us down and our final ball was poor.

"The lads are disappointed and so they should be. We weren't at our best today but we will get on with it and stick together."

It took Gillingham 21 minutes of a cagey opening to take the lead when Marlon King latched on to a long ball, cut inside Lewis Buxton and fired a deflected shot past Yoshikatsu Kawaguchi.

The second followed only seven minutes later when King played Bob Taylor in on the by-line and his powerfully flashed cross was tapped home by Paul Shaw.

After that the game fizzled out. Kawaguchi only made one save of note, turning King's shot on to the post just before half-time.

But Pompey didn't deserve to get anything out of the game and for Rix the most worrying thing was not that they were outplayed, but outfought.

The fighting spirit which had been in evidence in the other defeats deserted Portsmouth and the players looked more interested in getting home for their cold turkey sandwiches than trying to overturn the deficit.

Rix takes his side to Grimsby on Saturday - a team who have won one game in their last 20 - for a match he simply cannot afford to lose.