A summary of Lasse Sorensen & Michael Duff’s comments in their pre-Shrewsbury press conference

Lasse Sorensen and Michael Duff fielded questions from members of the press ahead of Huddersfield Town’s home game against Shrewsbury on Saturday afternoon. The match presents Town with a chance to make it four consecutive wins to start their season, and three wins in a row in the league but despite Shrewsbury representing relatively modesty opposition, Duff and his men won’t let complacency set in and will do everything they can to ensure a positive outcome.

Here’s a summary of the main things discussed during the press conference with a few of my thoughts thrown in along the way – they’re in italics, to make it easy to tell when I’m giving my opinion. The video of the full presser is embedded at the bottom of the article if you want to see the whole thing.

A summary of Lasse Sorensen’s comments ahead of the Shrewsbury game

Here’s what Lasse Sorensen had to say…

• Lasse if enjoying his time at Huddersfield. He enjoyed preseason and the start of the season. Shocking stuff!
• He hasn’t set himself any specific targets but wants to do well in every game. It’s more about doing his best in every game. But if he keeps up his current return, he’s on track for 46 assists. No pressure!
• Professionalism is higher than he expected at Town. He likes the big attendances and being at a bigger club. The recent improvements, plus the shift from Lincoln to Huddersfield has no doubt meant a leveling up for him in terms of the environment he’s training in and the stadium he plays home games in. 
• In answer to whether there were Championship clubs interested in him in the summer, he replied probably not and said if it was it was very early interest. He was only interested in joining Huddersfield and was increasingly sold on the idea as he found out more. The most interesting question and answer of the whole interview. “We beat off Championship clubs to his signature” has been said about most of our summer signings but the way Sorensen was a bit embarrassed and almost laughed off this question suggests it was only tentative interest at best in his case. Though based on what we’ve seen so far, we should expect interest from higher up the football pyramid in future transfer windows if he keeps up his recent form.
• While Town are expected to beat Shrewsbury, they are a tough team and they will give us a tricky game. Town can’t be complacent. You have to say this as a player going into a game, but privately, I hope he’s planning on filling his boots on Saturday and hoping to add to his assist tally and maybe a goal or two too.
• Sorensen is a believer in being happy all the time and tries to tries to keep a level head. Lasse Sorensen seems like a lovely guy and exactly the right character to have in the dressing room, so I can believe he is happy the majority of the time.  
• Used to be a central midfielder and converted to wingback about 18 months ago at Lincoln when they were short in that area. It suits his qualities and it’s now his favourite position. It’s interesting that he’s not got vast experience in this role as he seems a natural in the position. It makes me wonder if David Kasumu could make a similar transition, as we need cover in this area and I think that may be where he’s most effective.
• Wingback is similar to midfield but over to the side of the pitch. Genius! This sounded like one of those things that sounds more insightful in your head than when you say it out loud.
• Promotion is the team ambition, his personal goal is to develop with the club and see where it goes. A nice sidestepping of the question about his personal goals. Based on Duff’s remarks at the weekend about Lasse’s ambition, I suspect he hopes to play at the highest level if possible but he’s smart not to say that to the press because that becomes a story.
• There are patterns to his crossing that come from the training pitch but also there are adjustments in the moment based on where players are. The two assists at the weekend picked out runners perfectly, so something must be working.
• Training based a lot on stats. The numbers are followed carefully, so there’s no chance to let up or take it easy. This was an interesting answer, because Leon from the Yorkshire Post was throwing up a softball to allow Sorensen to blow his own trumpet about his own great mentality but instead he talked about how much the coaching staff track everything they do so players can’t take it easy in training. 
• He is a coffee fanatic, likes to get in the nerdy stuff about beans and whatnot, he’s also a family man, likes walks with his girlfriend. Sorensen describes himself as a boring guy and a coffee nerd. But rather than boring, I quite wanted to talk to him about what kind of coffee machine he has, how he grinds his beans, what part of the world his beans come from. Sadly no such follow up questions came, so we’ll never know…
• He played under Russell Martin in his early career on his first loan at MK Dons. Though the way Sorensen answered this question suggested it wasn’t a particularly defining moment of his career despite Russell Martin being flavour of the month now Southampton are back in the Premier League under his management. 
• He loves working under Michael Duff. He lets you know where you stand and is very clear in his expectations. Sets the tone and the mentality, the players are enjoying their work. This feels to be a very consistent message coming out of the dressing room, I think Duff is a bit of a taskmaster but the players are buying into what he’s doing and seeing the results from his methods so accept his authority.

A summary of Michael Duff’s pre-Shrewsbury’s thoughts

Here’s a summary of the main comments Duff made in his interview…

• Healey has trained, so is available for selection at the weekend. Reading between the lines, it sounds like he may not have trained enough to start the game on Saturday though. There sounded to be some doubt with his first training session being today (Thursday) and my guess woud be he’ll be on the bench at best.
• Radulovic is on the grass but in individual training. Ten days until he can join in with group training but it could be a long process to get match fit because he’s missed a lot of preseason. I think it’s possible Radulovic may not get on the pitch for quite a long time because he’s got to get properly fit and then prove himself to Duff before he gets minutes. Duff’s tone wasn’t suggesting that he sees Radders as the answer to all his striker-based problems. 
• Last week of the window, plates spinning, ins and outs before the window possible but happy if nothing changes. Domino effect possible but we’re not always in control of that. Market is starting to move. A big “wait and see” from Duff but it’s slightly disappointing that there isn’t anything more concrete to report given the obvious deficiencies within the squad.
• No bids but interest in the fringe players. Nobody is for sale, no bids for starting players from the last few games. This is more reassuring, as it sounds like we’re going to do our best to keep hold of the players I thought would probably leave this summer (suchas Helik, Nicholls and Spencer) though we’ll have to wait until the window closes to see how this pans out. 
• He feels he has a good squad but he always wants more. We’re competitive, as the three wins so far show. There’s a good mix of ages – improved by the summer signings mostly being players in the prime of their careers. He’ll work with what’s at the club and look to improve what’s there but also always wants more. The comments here are him showing that he basically knows his place in the structure of the club and can’t demand particular players because he’s the head coach not the manager. 
• Both those in and out of the team all get worked with so they’re ALL ready to go into the team if needed. Hardly needed saying but I suppose he’s showing that he’s fair to all the players and won’t freeze players out just because they’re not getting picked. Though Kyle Hudlin might not agree with him because he’s gone missing since he returned from his loan at the end of last season, apart from a couple of B Team appearances. 
• Shrewsbury will be a challenge, they’ve had a difficult start but will be organised and tough to beat. Duff doesn’t know how they’ll play as they use a variety of formations. Expectation will be for a Town win but they will come to get points and make life difficult for us. When Duff was at Cheltenham he was in their position and knew he had nothing to lose. Similar to Sorensen, Duff is making the right noises and showing respect to our opposition. However, surely he’s expecting a convincing victory against the favourites for relegation.
• Complacency can creep in if you think you’ve worked it out. If they fight harder than Town we’ll be in trouble. Being bookies favourites for a game is something we’ve got to get used to. Town have been on the other side of this too, and we occasionally got decent results through hard work and resilience. Though Town shouldn’t be outworked by many teams this season, so I’d hope this talk of complacency isn’t needed.
• Duff plans to do reviews after blocks of games to look at the progress. Likely to be ten games in. I’m not sure of the value of these sorts of reviews when every single game is analysed to death and even every training session. When you’re getting so into the weeds with every single piece of data, you’re constantly reviewing everything all the time anyway. But I suppose a more big-picture sort of review might help with the broader strategy side of things.
• Players shooting from 30 yards through a crowd of players should be upgraded to a better chance. He wants the players to keep moving the ball to look for higher percentage opportunities. This is something we can definitely improve on, as I think some players get a bit carried away when they get a vague sight on goal. While we shouldn’t be scared of shooting, some of the more speculative efforts are a waste of time. Duff talked about looking to make the extra pass so there’s a chance to shoot from a better area. I hope this doesn’t lead to the players taking it to the other extreme and them trying to pass it in but I think it’s wise to suggest shooting from areas where there’s the best chance of scoring.
• He’s always happy with wins but wants more every time too. This was in answer to a question about whether he’s ever happy. Maybe Lasse Sorensen can give him some tips in connecting with his inner sense of joy and wonderment. 
• Thought the biggest problem in the Stevenage game was the last twenty five minutes rather than the whole second half. He will always be demanding more. On Monday, when the emotions were reduced, he went through it all analytically with the players and showed them why it didn’t go well. Hopefully we’ll see in this Saturday’s game that the issues from the second half against Stevenage have been ironed out and we can get back to the flowing, attacking football we’ve mostly seen so far this season. 
• Duff has a variety of different ways of adjusting the 3-5-2 system to counter the shape of the opposition and to hurt them. This wasn’t a lengthy answer but I was intrigued by it because it hinted towards Duff’s mindset when it comes towards Plan B in games. If things aren’t going well, I suspect he’ll most likely play the main 3-5-2 a different way first before switching to a different shape. Though as the players get more comfortable with the nuances and variations of this shape, he may coach other formations. I think it’s sensible to avoid overloading the players with too many systems and shapes at one time though.
• Doesn’t look at league tables that much, more interested in following the process. Does every manager at every press conference get asked this? It’s pretty tedious as it’s nearly always the same answer. It’s like some kind of dreary ritual that managers and press trudge through regardless of there being nothing of interest in the answer for anybody.
• Duff doesn’t go in the dressing room during the week, so the players have to drive their own standards. Staff spend more time with the players than Duff does. They all have to drive standards, it’s not all on Duff. The culture is getting better but it’s not a habit yet but it’s improving. Quite interesting to hear that Duff is relatively hands off around the training ground. It sounds like he trusts his coaches to do a lot. In fairness, he has decent staff underneath him. There is a hint that the culture change he’s striving towards might not quite be where he wants it, with the remark about about the culture not being a habit yet. I take this to mean that the players all do the right things when there’s no pressure but when things go against them they slip into old habits, like against Stevenage in the second half last weekend. 
• My job is to unlock the potential in young people. Duff is great but he does sometimes slip into David Brent from The Office style soundbites.
• In Austria Duff got the players to spend time talking about themselves with each other to aid bonding. They had to talk about a hero, a hardship, family, motiviation, that kind of thing. Finding out things about people they spend a lot of time with so they can build common goals. As much as I’d do physical harm to myself to avoid participating in this sort of team building exercise personally, I can see the value in a squad of football players doing it to grow a tighter bond and get to know each other better. Is it better than getting drunk and playing golf together? Probably not but not everyone is Neil Warnock!