ALAN SWANN's Peterborough United talking points from easy Port Vale win as fortune favoured a brave manager ahead of a run of games against teams in the bottom half of the table

The easy selection – and I would still argue the right selection over the course of a season – would be to start two proven League One goalscorers in Jonson Clarke-Harris and Jack Marriott in every game.

It’s bold to field a 19 year-old ahead of either one of them, especially one that has scored just one League One goal in his career, and that arrived in a ‘dead’ game at the end of the last Posh promotion season.

But Ricky-Jade Jones was the PT’s man of the match in the 3-0 win against Port Vale at the Weston Homes Stadium. He didn’t score, but his sheer pace, power and skill down the left-hand side of the Posh front three plus his boundless enthusiasm wreaked havoc within the visiting defence.

Jones was overshadowed in the first-half by the 21 year-old on the other flank as Kwame Poku set up two goals for skipper Jonson Clarke-Harris, the second after racing past beleagured centre-back Dan Jones for about the fifth time in five minutes.

Poku slowed down in the second-half, but Jones remained full of running for his 71 minutes on the pitch. If he maintains this sort of form form there will be some nervous looking third tier defenders pitching up at London Road.

TALKING POINTS…

1) I’m not completely sold on 4-3-3, although there are Posh players it certainly suits, like Saturday’s midfield three of Ben Thompson, Jeando Fuchs and Jack Taylor, although I’m not sure both Thompson and Fuchs are needed against weak opposition like Port Vale. It obviously suits Jones and Poku with the latter looking far more comfortable out wide than in a more central role. It was fascinating listening to chairman Darragh MacAnthony’s podcast last week as he revealed the club’s work in the summer transfer market was carried out with a 4-3-3 formation in mind, a system that was abandoned after one half of the first game at Cheltenham.

It was the formation McCann employed when winning the League One title with Hull City, but the Tigers had Mallik Wilks and Keane Lewis-Potter on the flanks and they are superior players to anyone in the current Posh squad, at the moment at least.

It bothers me that Joe Ward has to play as a right-back in the system (unless he replaces Poku). It should be significant that Ward scored after he’d been pushed further forward.

2) Posh only looked uncomfortable against Vale when the visitors stuck four players up front and started hoofing the ball long around the hour mark. As Posh fielded two midfielders at full-back, neither of whom are comfortable in the air, there was a vulnerabilty for about five minutes.

Credit to McCann though for acknowledging the threat and making swift changes of his own to counter it. On came Nathan Thompson to play in the middle of a back three and on came Marriott to partner Clarke-Harris as Posh moved to a 3-4-1-2 line-up and within three minutes Marriott had sent Ward through to score and kill the game off.

McCann’s use of substitutes in the previous home game against Fleetwood was criticised, but he was spot on with his changes yesterday. Add to his starting line-up success it was an excellent day for the manager.

3) The starting line-up for an away game at MK Dons next weekend will be interesting though. It would be a risk to start the match at stadium:mk with Ward and Burrows as full-backs. Dan Butler must be in line for a start at left-back if he comes through a planned 90-minute run-out with the under 21s at Barnsley on Tuesday and can Posh really afford to have a defender as experienced, as talented and as versatile as Nathan Thompson on the bench? And what to do with Ward if Thompson plays? And Ronnie Edwards will be back. Given full fitness status for all players, and assuming 4-3-3 remains, I would go: Bergstrom, N. Thompson, Knight, Kent, Butler: B. Thompson, Fuchs, Taylor: Ward, Clarke-Harris, Jones. This flies in the face of my recent suggestion that Marriott would play the central striking role better than Clarke-Harris, which he could, but you can’t drop a striker who has just scored twice in a game!

4) Football folk like to say they don’t look at a league table until 10 games have been played. We’re now at that stage and Posh sit eighth, just two points outside the top six having won five (satisfactory) and lost five (unsatisfactory) matches which is on the whole disappointing, especially given four of the first five matches were won. It’s a long old season though and Posh now face matches v MK Dons (18th in the table), Burton (bottom), Forest Green (22nd), Wycombe (17th), Oxford (19th) and Accrington (13th) before tackling Cambridge United who will surely have dropped from their lofty seventh place by the end of October. It could well be the next seven games are against teams in the bottom half of the table so time to make a move.

5) It was a weird week off the pitch as the January appointment of a club CEO – one who disappeared in May – led to EFL charges just as news of a rift between two of the three club owners was confirmed. The rift isn’t Posh related so fans needn’t get too concerned about the club’s immediate wellbeing. Thankfully players are good at shutting out noise and the win and performance yesterday meant the actual football became the main talking point, just as it should be.