Gannon's research pays off with a win
TOMMY Williams led the cheerleading section for new Posh manager Jim Gannon.
TOMMY Williams led the cheerleading section for new Posh manager Jim Gannon.Gannon opened his Posh career with a hard-fought 1-0 Championship win over QPR at London Road after the visitors were reduced to nine men by two red cards in the second half.
Williams was deployed as the third centre-back in an innovative 3-4-1-2 formation and the team's oldest player at 29 wasn't surprised that Posh toppled his old club such has been the impression made by Gannon in just five days at London Road.
Full match report: Posh 1, QPR 0
Williams said: "The research the manager did before the game and the information he passed on was amazing. He is obviously very thorough in his preparations as well as a good communicator and the lads responded to him.
"He pretty much told us what two formations he wants to use this season and we worked hard on this particular one all week.
"I enjoyed playing where I did and the system seemed to suit all the players. The goal we scored arrived because we had George Boyd roving around in a free role, but the other lads all did their jobs well.
"There is a big onus on the wing-backs in this system, but Chris Whelpdale and Tommy Rowe were superb getting up and down the wings.
"It was an encouraging start for a new manager and the win will give us all a lot of confidence. We struggled a bit towards the end because we kept giving free-kicks away and nine men really only had a chance of scoring from a set-piece.
"But we needed to get a result quickly and if we pick up another one straight away we will be right back in with a chance of staying up."
Gannon remains hopeful rather than confident that he can help launch a great escape, but he was obviously delighted to have made a winning start as manager.
Gannon said: "It was a good start and the lads did great. We perhaps could have looked after possession better towards the end, but our priority going into the game was a clean sheet and we achieved that in style.
"The three lads at the back were awesome. I didn't expect the players to pick up everything about the system overnight so there are things to improve on."
It was just a fourth Championship win for Posh and their first since December 19. It was a first clean sheet since a 0-0 draw at Ipswich on December 8.
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Thursday 18 March 2010
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