Surely a professional footballer should be able to adapt to either way of playing.
Not really. Players have their positions because that’s where they’re best at playing. If you play them in another position they won’t play as well regardless of the coaching & if you go off what Barrow said & presumably why Cook very swiftly decided to get rid, he isn;t the best at taking advice on board
Stuart Barlow was a great centre forward for us but he fed off the work of Liddell & Haworth (I use the term “work” very loosely about Haworth). Play him as a lone striker & he’d have been awful.