Never before could the adage 'a game of two halves' been more relevant.

Two-down at the break, Town responded in the best possible way to their half-time rollicking and simply blew away their shell-shocked hosts.

Understandably, Marcus Bent and Pablo Counago grabbed the headlines after netting two goals apiece.

But this was as much about a 'substitution of attitude', as boss Joe Royle put it, in terms of the vastly improved team performance.

Another key factor was their change of formation.

Town went from three-five-two to four-four-two and the flurry of goals which followed highlighted its effectiveness.

Like last week, they came in quick succession the Blues' coming in a dramatic 17 minutes and Bent was first to make the scoresheet, albeit in fortunate circumstances.

Jim Magilton rolled a free-kick into the path of Martijn Reuser and his stinging shot deflected off the striker and looped over Gary Montgomery.

Town had the bit between their teeth and it was no surprise more goals followed, especially given the new-found menace of Bent and Counago.

The Spaniard was next to capitalise, wriggling between two defenders before coolly slotting past Montgomery.

And Counago grabbed the third from a well-worked corner, taken by Reuser and aimed straight at Tommy Miller.

His shot flew straight at the striker, whose deft touch was enough to find the net.

Bent made it comfortable after latching onto a perfect through ball from Jim Magilton, pulling the ball down before slotting past an out-of-position Montgomery.

It was a quite remarkable turnaround, given the ineptitude of the first-half performance.

Loanee Jansen broke the deadlock, forcing the ball over the line after David Pipe's close-range effort cannoned off the bar, following a teasing cross by Jay Bothroyd.

And Gordon doubled the lead a minute before the break, powering past Andy Marshall after Thomas Gaardsoe half-cleared a delivery by Craig Pead.

Published Monday, April 14, 2003

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