New Sheffield Wednesday boss Garry Monk will 'adapt his style' for Owls squad

The 40-year-old manager, who is said to be considering adding former Sheffield United forward James Beattie to his coaching staff alongside assistant manager Lee Bullen, refused to be drawn on what tactics he would employ at Hillsborough.

Monk had his first chance to assess his charges as he took training for the first time today and will take to a Wednesday dugout for the first time at Huddersfield on Sunday.

He has a track record, he said, for designing a style of play around the qualities in his side.

"I like it to be aggressive,” he said.

"But the key is to recognise early in your managerial career is that people can talk about philosophies and things like that, but a lot of it is buzzwords and very few teams in this world have a philosophy.

"The key I learned very early in management is to understand the squad you have got and try to play to its strengths.”

Monk has managed at Swansea City, Leeds United, Middlesbrough and Birmingham City within the last five years and has implemented different tactics at each club.

His approach at Birmingham, for example, saw the club revert to a 4-4-2 formation, with his Leeds side showing much more fluidity.

Monk said: "I try and adapt myself to the squad I have. It worked very successfully at Leeds and Birmingham. Middlesbrough was different as I didn't quite get the time to do that.

"I try and get squads to play to their strengths as if they do that, they are going to be comfortable, confident and give themselves the best opportunity to show that.

"Of course, you address the weaknesses along the way, but the main emphasis for me in recent years has been focusing on the strength of the squad and trying to make that shine through.”