Formation change was forced upon us, says Pompey boss
John Mousinho chose the anniversary of his Pompey appointment to ditch a back four for the first time.
Yet he’s unsure whether the system switch to three centre-halves will be retained, despite a return to winning ways at Fleetwood.
The Blues’ head coach revealed a neck problem for Joe Rafferty and Zak Swanson’s ongoing injury issues left him without a recognised right-back for Saturday’s trip to Highbury Stadium.
Instead, on a year to the day since joining Pompey, he opted to line up with a back three and the formation change drove a 1-0 success.
Mousinho has still to decide if he will continue with his new system beyond this weekend.
He told The News: ‘With Joe Rafferty being injured, we didn’t really have a choice. I didn’t think there were any natural replacements to slot in there.
‘It’s nothing long term, he just had a problem with his neck earlier in the week and was touch and go whether he would be fit.
‘It also seemed like it might be a game to suit three centre-backs on the pitch, with how physical Fleetwood are.
‘It was the right thing to do going to that shape and, in my opinion, players should be able to adjust to shapes – and they did it really well.
‘It would have been nice to have a bit more time to work on it, but, from what I saw, especially in the first half, in terms of our ability to get the ball down and play on a very, very difficult pitch, the lads adjusted to it very well.
‘I don’t know whether we’ll use it again, it depends on injuries, but I thought it worked well on Saturday.
It’s really good to have that flexibility and for the lads to be able to switch into that with a day’s notice is great.
‘For the year I’ve been here, it has been a back four starting every time and that’s the system I prefer, but, at any point in the game, if you take a snapshot of the pitch, the players are in different positions.
‘It never looks like a
4-3-3 or a 4-2-3-1, we want players to rotate into different shapes, in and out of possession as well, so I think they’re flexible enough to do it.’
Mousinho added: ‘In the second half, Fleetwood pressed us a lot higher, the game changes, and the pitch became more difficult to play on, which is a factor.’