There is talk of an orchestrated demonstration and calls for a resignation at Fratton Park before the match against Everton today. An umbrella organisation, the Pompey Virtual Alliance (PVA), now consists of representatives of 12 fans’ websites and such is its power that it can mobilise some 20,000 followers at the touch of a keyboard.

But who they demonstrate against, whose head they call for, that is anyone’s guess. It could be Paul Hart, the manager, it could be Sulaiman al-Fahim, the new owner; it could perfectly well be both.

It could just be that Peter Storrie, the chief executive, goes first.

A story in The News, the Portsmouth daily paper, yesterday reported Storrie as “on the brink of walking out”. It was only the previous day that Storrie had given an interview to The Times in which he pledged to the club his long-term future, but so quickly do Portsmouth appear to be spinning out of control that any of the three could lose their grip first.

It was at 3.30pm on Thursday that Storrie was busily insisting: “I’m not finished here yet; I’ve got lot more to do.” That evening he attended a black-tie naval dinner, and by the next morning, al-Fahim had cancelled the entire day’s schedule of appointments that Storrie had organised.

The day before that, al-Fahim had been in Valencia, where, naturally, in his role as chairman of the United Arab Emirates Chess Federation, he had been playing exhibition matches with Anatoly Karpov and Garry Kasparov. There, he used the platform of the Spanish media to announce that Portsmouth would have no funds for buying players in the January transfer window, whereas to Storrie, he had previously said the opposite.

While Portsmouth are an increasingly hard club to support, they appear to be impossible to work for. Storrie had been due to meet al-Fahim yesterday afternoon; so, too, had Hart, to talk about bringing in an assistant manager. Both meetings were cancelled.

Earlier that day, al-Fahim had also blown out meetings with the media. Even more significantly, he had cancelled a longstanding agreement to meet the PVA. However, so venomous was the Alliance’s reaction that at noon yesterday he had changed his mind and met the fans last night.

The initial image of al-Fahim as the somewhat flashy “fake sheikh” with a can-do self-confidence and an appetite for self-publicity appears to be beginning to fray under pressure. What we see increasingly is a man who is not confident with his English and is intimidated by the scrutiny and the accountability.

Whatever his identity, though, it is largely irrelevant if he can show Portsmouth the money. So far he has not done so. So far he remains all promise and no delivery.

But this, of course, is a double implosion, one, al-Fahim, and two, the team, like two spent swimmers dragging each other ever downwards. With six league defeats from six, the team are a disaster, a failure unprecedented in the history of the Premier League, yet under the circumstances, is anyone genuinely surprised?

Down at the training ground on Thursday, a familiar scene unfolded. Hart gave his traditional pre-match press conference and the questioning, which started cool and friendly, got hotter and less comfortable.

Hart is not a natural for the spotlight, anyway; he is diligent rather than charismatic. On this occasion, he lasted about ten minutes, he fielded awkward questions about “pressure”, but when it came to “How many defeats before you are cut adrift?”, a friendly hand was planted on his shoulder by Gary Double, the club’s director of communications. “I think we’ve had enough,” Double said before leading away the manager.

This was apparently the fourth consecutive walkout from a press conference, although Double later put out a statement clarifying that this did not classify as a walkout, more an enforced halt.

However, this impression of impending doom is not yet universal. It may surprise outsiders that the squad’s beginning-of-the-season buoyancy has not yet been completely flattened.

This is largely because of the unique circumstances. Normally a manager on six defeats from six would be hanging; here you have a manager half of whose team was recruited within three days of the closing of the transfer window. Hart has been forced to do traditional pre-season work in the midst of the regular season with defeats, fan unrest and financial uncertainty bursting like rain clouds above his head, and although his team have been beaten every time, there have been slow signs of improvement.

After the Aston Villa defeat last weekend, David James, the most senior figure left in the dressing room, addressed the team and told them to be encouraged. In front of him, he sees on the field a group of players unbowed and determined to make a success of their opportunity in the Barclays Premier League.

As Storrie said: “The easiest job in the world is to say: ‘We’ve lost six games, we’ll blame it all on the manager and we’ll sack him.’ ”

However, in these circumstances, a different equation comes into play: are they improving enough so that they will catch up? Or is the slope so steep that it needs a new man to dig some heels in?

The popular view is that if they go eight from eight — that takes in Everton and next Saturday’s game away to Wolverhampton Wanderers — then Hart goes, too. But who would do better? Who even would want to take their chance?

What is clear is that Hart would have had a better chance with the team if al-Fahim had done a better job with the takeover. For all the illusions of Middle East wealth, al-Fahim bought Portsmouth and then went in search of finance when it should have been the other way round.

Twelve days ago, the Premier League introduced a rule imposing a transfer embargo when it believes a club are in danger of falling into administration. Yet this rule was already being applied to Portsmouth in August, their transfer- market shopping all blocked until those last three days when they were cleared for some cut-price purchases.

Even those were tied up in finance plans that do not involve Portsmouth having to part with any money for a considerable time. And if there is one reason why Storrie will stay, it is because, as he said: “There were a couple of payments to clubs which wanted clarification that I was still going to be around before they would agree to some of the payment terms. I was happy to agree with them.”

It was after the close of the transfer window that al-Fahim went to the United States to find funds for the promised refinancing. However, now that he is back, there is still only talk, no certainty, so much so that for the chief executive of the club, Storrie is notably uneasy on the subject of the future.

Is there or is there not finance in place? “That’s not my domain,” he replied, “that’s Sulaiman.”

Can you guarantee that Portsmouth can now meet their debt payments? “That’s something Sulaiman works on, not me. Once he took hold of the company, that’s his decision, not mine.”

Are you still on a promise of finance? “My concentration’s been on football. The indication is: yes it will be [forthcoming]. I can’t say any stronger than that.”

Why did the takeover take so long? “I can’t answer that. And to be fair, I genuinely don’t know.”

For Storrie, the proof will only come on the debt-repayment dates, when he asks al-Fahim for the money.

If he delivers, then there is a future. Alternatively, al-Fahim could buy some players in January, or he could send in the diggers to start work on the new training ground.

For now, though, it is all obfuscation. Neither the team nor the owner are yet delivering; at some stage, for both, it will be too late.

Loss leaders

6 Premier League defeats in a row by Portsmouth at the start of this season

7 Teams have begun a top-flight season with six defeats or worse. Of those, three were relegated (Birmingham City 1895-96, Bolton Wanderers 1902-03, Manchester United 1930-31) and four stayed up (Liverpool 1899-1900, Cardiff City 1921-22, Everton 1958-59, Leicester City 1983-84)

12 Defeats by Manchester United represents the worst start. They finished bottom of the first division.

15 The final league position in 1983-84 of Leicester City, the last team in the old first division to start with six defeats. Their seventh game was a 2-2 draw with Stoke City and they then lost two more, to Birmingham and Norwich City, before the recovery started.

37 Goals scored by Gary Lineker (22) and Alan Smith (15) that lifted Leicester to safety