FC Halifax Town: Switch to 3-5-2 has given us a new lease of life, says wing-back Williams

The Shaymen are yet to lose since switching formations after their 5-1 hammering at Stockport County on Boxing Day.

And Williams, who has started every game in the new system at left wing-back, feels Halifax are a different team now to the one that succumbed so meekly at Edgeley Park.

“It was a bit of lesson at Stockport, we weren’t working hard enough,” he said.
“But we played them again and got what I thought was a good result, 0-0, and we’ve gone from there.

“Everyone’s bought into it, everyone’s working hard, we can see that from our running stats.
“I’ve enjoyed it, and I know Jeff (King) is on the other side. I used to play there for Dundee, Inverness and Chester, so I’m familiar with it.
“It seems to be working as well, that’s four unbeaten now.
“We’d leaked a few goals in the two games before we changed it, so defensively I think we’re a lot better. Defensively it’s helped us massively.
“And going forward, it creates width from myself and Jeff. Everyone’s working hard at it.
“It’s still new to us, we’re working hard on it in training and hopefully we can keep getting better in it.”

The 31-year-old admits his wing-back role is very different to the left-wing position he had been playing until recently.
“It’s tough, there’s a lot of running, a lot of defensive work. You’re out there on your own at times,” he said.

“But the midfielders work so hard getting across the pitch, Charlie Cooper getting across and Josh Staunton getting up and down.
“The strikers are working defensively as well.

“When we’ve not got the ball now, we’ve got five at the back, and when we’ve got it, we spread it wide.”

Williams says the Town squad have been fully on-board with the change from day one.

“We were straight into it, the gaffer changed it and that was that, and we ended up winning,” he said.

“We’ve stuck with it and we’ve been getting good results.

“We were behind it as soon as he said it. We thought something needed to change because we weren’t getting results.

“The gaffer’s gone with it and the boys have bought into it really well. I think you can see the last few performances have been much better.”