In my opinion, with the current resources at our disposal, we've got to bin the 4-4-2 and (though it really pains me to say it) abandon the notion of playing with two up top for the foreseeable future, because we do need a third central midfielder to shore up the defensive side of the team. I also believe that with Boldewijn, Dennis and Thomas in attacking positions we would have enough creativity and goal power to play without two outright strikers, which certainly wasn't the case when we tried it with previous personnel in the past.

Nolan was experimenting with a 3-5-2 in the second half against Yeovil, no doubt in a desperate attempt to find a way of keeping two strikers up front, but I'm not at all convinced that Boldewijn would be comfortable playing wing-back, and it would leave no role at all for Nathan Thomas, so for now the only way forward I can see is either 4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1. For demonstration purposes I'm going to assume Tootle will be fit, otherwise I'd sooner bring in Bird and move Duffy to right-back than play Hewitt there again, but maybe we could look something like this:-

---------------Fitzsimons

-----Tootle---Duffy----- Brisley----- Kellett

--------Hewitt---Crawford----Vaughan

------Boldewijn---Dennis-----Thomas

OR

------------------ Fitzsimons

-----Tootle---Duffy----- Brisley----- Kellett

-----------Hewitt-------Vaughan

------Boldewijn--Alessandra ---Thomas

-------------------Dennis

Depending on your view, you could easily change a couple of the personnel, for instance if you think Bird should directly replace either Duffy or Brisley, or if you would prefer Husin or Kellett as the attacking midfielder, or keep Jones at left-back, but does anyone agree that these would be better formations than 4-4-2 in the current, less than ideal circumstances?