How Danny Cowley intends to get Portsmouth out of League One at fifth attempt

The Blues head coach outlined the fast-paced approach using width he will be drilling into his players when they return for pre-season training.

And the 42-year-old explained he will be fluid in terms of formation as he attempts to get his new club out of League One at the fifth attempt.

Cowley said: ‘We want to attack with width.

‘We want to go through, if we can’t go through we go around, if we can’t go around we can go over too.

‘They are our ways to trying to break down our opponent.

‘Our preference is to always go fast, we like to go fast before they get set up.

‘We like to go fast before they get set up, if we can’t do that we go through, around or over.

That’s how we always like to set our teams up.

‘If you look at the top end of the pitch, there’s one formation when you are in your own half in the build phase and press-break phase.

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‘There’s another formation in the attacking half and then when you think about against the ball, there’s a formation against the ball in the opposing half and there’s another formation in your own half.

‘Football’s a pretty fluid game. They don’t stand on the same blade of grass for 90 minutes - they move.’

Cowley has used a number of different formations in his short time at Fratton Park to manage what he views as an imbalance squad.

But he underlined how he feels there is perhaps too much focus on that area, when increasingly side’s switch their set-ups so regularly during games.

He said: ‘I get why people want to talk about formations.

‘I like the conversation that shouldn’t it be 1-4-4-2 or 1-4-3-3, but the goalie always seems to get ignored doesn’t he?

‘It’s more that I always think football is 50 per cent in possession and 50 per cent out of possession. So you have to respect both sides of the game.

‘We always aim to do that.’

A message from the Editor, Mark Waldron

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