KARL Robinson has revealed that Portsmouth won’t be able to sign any Oxford United players for a year following the south coast club’s hiring of John Mousinho as head coach.

The departure of United’s former club captain was confirmed on Friday, as he took his first steps into management.

Mousinho oversaw a 2-0 win against Exeter City at Fratton Park yesterday, ending a run of 10 games without a win in Sky Bet League One.

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Asked whether Mousinho might take players or coaching staff with him to Pompey, U’s boss Robinson said: “Part of the contract agreement is that for 12 months, that can’t be the case anyway.

“It’s about protecting assets, but John’s been very respectful to Oxford United.

“He goes 100 per cent with my blessing.”

Prior to joining Portsmouth, Mousinho was contracted to the U’s until the summer.

Quizzed on the compensation package between the two clubs, Robinson said: “You’ve got to respect the fact the contractual agreements that we speak about between the clubs stay between the clubs.

“There was a contractual agreement in place and compensation rights that we all agreed on, and a certain aspect of the contract that we asked to be in from our point of view, and Portsmouth agreed with all of them terms.

“There was no malice in anything to do with the deal, this was a deal where nobody wanted to come out of it falling out and it was done very amicably.”

Mousinho was often on the touchline as part of Robinson’s coaching set-up and was also responsible for United’s set pieces, both defensively and offensively.

Robinson said first team coach Leon Blackmore-Such would take on some of the work previously done by Mousinho.

“We’ve got Leon who’s fantastic and still learning the ropes, and he’ll step up and have more of a key role,” said Robinson.

“If you spoke to any of the players at the football club, Leon’s one of the best coaches they’ve worked with.

“Leon’s taken over set pieces and made one or two changes to them.

“We all have an input from set plays so it’s not a massive change to them.

“We speak about developing players, but we develop people and part of that is giving people every opportunity.”