Adam Hinshelwood eyeing versatility from York City recruit

Stones joined York last Saturday prior to their 1-0 defeat at Gainsborough Trinity, but was cup tied due to his previous loan spell at Oldham Athletic, meaning that City supporters had to wait before seeing their new man in action.

A postponement last weekend against Maidenhead United, as well as the midweek cancellation of the trip to Rochdale, means that fans have had to wait longer than hoped for to see Stones.

With the striker joining on a permanent basis from Wigan Athletic for a reportedly hefty transfer fee, and having played for Oldham, Hinshelwood is planning to be patient before his newest addition can deliver, with the boss expecting it to take time before Stones can adapt to York’s differing style of play.

“He’s had a good couple of sessions, but it’s going to take him time,” Hinshelwood admitted.

“It’s not like he’s come from a team that plays completely the same type of style, it’s a completely different style that he has come to.

“It’s going to take him a little while to adjust to that, he’ll be the first to admit that training might be a bit different to where he has come from, because teams set-up differently.

“We’ve all got our own ways and own ideas of how the games should be played, and how you can win games of football.

“It’s not always the same style, so obviously it’s going to take a little bit longer for someone coming from a different style.

“We’ve got to give Josh time, even Ollie [Pearce] has been superb this season but he didn’t come in and hit the ground running.

“It took him a while to adjust, and I’m sure it’ll be the same for Josh as well.”

Hinshelwood also responded to questions on whether the introduction of Stones could affect his formation and how City set-up, with York also possessing the quality of Ollie Pearce, Dipo Akinyemi and Lenell John-Lewis.

The manager wasn’t opposed to potentially moving to a two up front set-up and confirmed that it’s something the squad has been working on in training, and even spoke on the possibility of playing both Ashley Nathaniel-George and Tyrese Sinclair as wing-backs in a back five formation.

He continued: “Certain games as well we’re not adverse to changing our formation to suit what the game might entail.

“Although it’s worked well for us to have just the one up top, there have been times this season where we have changed to a two and that has sort of helped us as well.

“We’ve got to be flexible, having Josh in allows us to be that and we can definitely mix up our shape a bit now.

“We can play with two up top, Dipo can come into that as well and play as an out and out striker, Ashley Nathaniel-George and Ty [Tyrese Sinclair] can equally do well as wing-backs.

“There is the make-up in the team to go to a three [at the back] as well.

“Being adaptable to different shapes is something that I really like to be, and having those options in the team to do that really helps.

“We work on different formations and what it might look like for a plan A and a plan B if you’d like, but a lot of our work is geared around our formation, our style and how we want to play.

“We try and balance that with giving the players a little bit, so we’re not just feeding them different shapes everyday.

“We try and get the balance right, but we do spend a lot of time on our shape and how we want to play.

“It’ll take a while for Josh to get to grips with how we want to play, but I’m sure that when he does, we’ll have a real exciting player.”

Hinshelwood also spoke on how versatility could be important to his side in their bid for promotion from the National League this season, especially now that City have four recognised strikers for what could potentially be one slot.

Ricky Aguiar was an example the manager used as someone who has shown versatility this season, operating at central midfield, centre-back and left-back

“I like to keep you all on your toes and keep you guessing!

“Ricky [Aguiar] was in at left-back and no one probably would have seen that [coming], but he moved back to centre-back and did so well, he got man-of-the-match from that position and defended so well.

“Ricky has been left-back in a team that kept a clean sheet against Gateshead, who are renowned for scoring lots of goals.

“He’s done really well there and we’ve got different options, we can move players about and different games will suit different types of formations and different sorts of players.

“I believe that we’ve got the personnel to be able to change that now, which is really good and it’s down to us to come up with the right answers and the right game plan for future games.”