Report from Paul Evans
I am sure that with a midfield really committed to getting two or three forward to support the lone striker it can be quite an attacking formation. Unfortunately however the 4-5-1 being seen in the Premiership every week makes for boring and careful football with only one of the midfield five apparently being given the licence to help ot the lone striker.
I am afraid it was the Premiership type of 4-5-1 that was in view for much of the first half today as our reserves became the first City side I can recall using the system in what turned out to be a well deserved 2-0 win over Plymouth.
Perhaps, I am being a bit unkind there because it was a good win for our second string over a Plymouth team featuring plenty of players with first team experience like McCormack, Connolly, Lasley (we were after him once I seem to remember) and Summerfield as well as Arthur Gnohere the ex Burnley centre half who QPR sacked last season.
However, the first forty five minutes especially was hard going as a City side, looking solid defensively like most sides who play this system do, struggled to create much going forward.
What chances there were invariably came from errors like when Derbyshire shot wastefully wide for the visitors when the City's offside trap went wrong and Ryan Morgan (a last minute replacement for Neil Cox) had to block after possession was given away on the edge of the box by Jacobson.
City did have a couple of chances when Ferretti, ploughing a lone furrow up front, was worked clear, firstly by some neat passing down the left and then from a good ball out of defence by Jacobson, but, on both ocassions, a lack of options and support meant that he had to shoot early with the result that his first effort was comfortably saved by McCormack and the second flew well wide.
It was hard to see where a goal was going to come from, but then, after about thirty five minutes, the visitors defence decided to help City out as they failed to clear Kift's pass into the box and Ferretti was able to collect and score easilly.
On the balance of play, Plymouth were unlucky to be 1-0 down at half time, and when City decided to replace Darlington with Darcy Blake at the interval and then Mulryne with Greg Coombes very early in the second half, you couldn't help thinking that they would struggle to hang on to their lead.
As it turned out though, both of the replacements played a full part in a more dominant City display which also occasionally showed that 4-5-1 doesn't have to be the turgid affair produced every week by the so called elite with Coombes in particular working hard to get forward to support Ferretti.
What was now a very young back line coped very well with the visitors attack and, again, it was only through errors like when Morgan's weak back pass was picked up by striker Zebroski only for Parslow to make an excellent saving tackle that the visitors really threatened.
Whilst City were still not creating too many chances, they were now dominating territorially forcing plenty of corners as Plymouth were pressed back and eventually they scored from one of them when Parslow, who had gone very close with a header earlier, hit a cross shot which was tapped in from about a yard out by Ferretti who now had Scott McCoubrey alongside him as a striking partner after replacing Paul Parry.
City comfortably played out the last ten minutes or so to beat a team who probably should really be their closest rivals at this level. There were some good performances today, but I thought Parslow for marshalling the defence so well, Khalil for a hard working display with clever passing and Ferretti for giving an experienced pair of visiting centrebacks quite a few problems were the pick of our players.
Of course, we probably played 4-5-1 because there was no Stuart Fleetwood to support Ferretti up front and Anthony Taylor and Lloyd Jenkins were missing as well - I hope and trust that they will all be back in action soon.
However, it was the other player involved in last weeks crash that was never far from my thoughts watching this game. This is the fifth year that I have been watching the reserve side on a regular basis and I wouldn't mind betting that Nicky Fish has played in more of those games than any other player on the staff - it just didn't seem the same today watching the reserve team play without Nicky's wholehearted and effective play in our midfield. Once again I would like to pass on my best wishes to Nicky and his family - obviously, the first priority is to see his health restored, but, hopefully, we will also see him back out on the pitch in the future.