Blog – Page 24 – Terrier Spirit – Huddersfield Town FC blog

Oct32022 by Terrier Spirit9 Comments

Soft goals, Sorba’s cupped ear, Russell’s aimless wandering, a collective failure and nursing fragile confidence – notes on a bruising defeat to Reading

Matches

Mark Fotheringham became the eighth consecutive permanent new Town boss to lose their first game in charge when he lost 3-1 to Reading on Saturday. It was an abject performance from the Terriers which highlighted many of the issues that have plagued the team since the start of the season. Despite some strangely upbeat post match comments, Mark Fotheringham must be deeply concerned about some of the things he saw on Saturday as Reading barely had to get out of second gear to brush aside a Town team that looked completely inept at times. Here are some of my thoughts on the game in more detail… Three soft goal give Reading an easy afternoon's work The first goal Town conceded was the most forgivable, with Rudoni being out jumped on a corner but then again, it wasn't a clever pi...

Oct12022 by Terrier Spirit3 Comments

Predicted lineup, style of play, touchline behaviour, ex-players returning – Huddersfield Town v Reading preview

Matches

Mark Fotheringham takes charge of his first Huddersfield Town game this afternoon, away at Reading. The Royals were widely tipped for relegation at the start of this season by many (including this blog) but a fine start to the season sees them sat third in the table and they represent a tough first challenge for Fotheringham (I keep wanting to shorten his name to Fozzy bear but I suspect he's too serious for nicknames). In advance of this afternoon's action, I'm going to take a look at some of the main talking points to watch out for in the game… Predicted lineup Fotheringham said he had a clean bill of health heading into this game but the club's training video they released a few days ago didn't show Jonathan Hogg training, so I suspect he's still either injured or at best only ...

Sep302022 by Terrier Spirit4 Comments

Who was the last Huddersfield Town boss to win their first game? – The new manager bounce is a myth

News, Opinion

Mark Fotheringham takes charge of his first game as Huddersfield Town head coach tomorrow afternoon and I suspect many Reading fans will fear that we will be beneficiaries of the famous new manager bounce. However, my instinct was that Huddersfield Town never seem to get good results straight away under new managers and we usually have to wait at least a little while before getting their first win. To see if I was right I waded through the record books (not really, I just looked it up online) and found I was right - new managers, or head coaches, have lost their first game in charge going back for a very long time. Here’s a quick rundown of just how far back you have to go in Huddersfield Town history before you’ll find a Huddersfield Town boss who actually won their first game in...

Sep292022 by Terrier Spirit12 Comments

What kind of head coach will Mark Fotheringham be?

Opinion, Tactics

Mark Fotheringham has been appointed Huddersfield Town’s new head coach. He is the fifth of Town’s last six managerial appointments to come with no significant experience of being the head coach of a men’s football team. In fairness, gambling on inexperience has paid off half of the time in the past, with Wagner and Corberan both overperforming with limited resources. But we’ve also seen Siewert and Schofield crash and burn too. So we know how much of a gamble it is to let someone take their first steps into management at Championship level, where the games come thick and fast with no margin for error or time to learn on the job. Because Mark Fotheringham hasn’t worked as a permanent head coach anywhere previously, we don’t have anything to go on in terms of his track record. So i...

Sep182022 by Terrier Spirit9 Comments

Rhodes’ goal, Camara’s graft, Nicholls’ save, Thomas’ miss, Pelach’s passion – Notes on Huddersfield Town’s win over Cardiff

Matches

Huddersfield Town won their second game of the season yesterday in a narrow, scrappy game against Cardiff. It was a hard-fought game where neither team played amazing football but Town showed a bit of grit and determination that has been sorely lacking in recent weeks and managed to hang on to their narrow lead, mostly thanks to a Lee Nicholls penalty save in the first half and, admittedly, a fairly poor Cardiff team. Here are a few of my thoughts on the game which seem to centre around a few key figures from Town’s squad yesterday… Jordan Rhodes and the goal It’s not been easy for Jordan Rhodes in his second spell at Town. He signed while carrying a back injury and by the time he was fully fit Danny Ward was in excellent form and Rhodes was limited to cameo’s from the bench. To a...

Sep172022 by Terrier Spirit6 Comments

Predicted Huddersfield Town lineup to take on Cardiff

Matches

Huddersfield Town play Cardiff later today with Narcis Pelach taking the reins as caretaker boss. The Spaniard (somewhat unexpectedly) was spared the chop when Danny Schofield was shown the door earlier this week and will lead the team today. He sounded pretty impressive in his prematch press conference and it may well be that he does a decent job today in what is likely to be his only game in charge, given the international break should be ample time for the board to find a long-term replacement for Schofield to be appointed. Trying to predict the team for today’s game is going to be trickier due to the change in management but I can’t imagine there will be a huge change in thinking, given that Pelach has been a central figure in both the Corberan and Schofield coaching teams. Because ...

Sep152022 by Terrier Spirit8 Comments

Should David Wagner return to Huddersfield Town?

News, Opinion

Danny Schofield has gone. I was going to write a blogpost about it but I don’t think there’s any point as everyone already knows the talking points: he’s a nice guy, he was out of his depth and he probably shouldn’t have been given it in the first place. There’s not much point dragging that out to 1,000 words of waffle. It’s a genuine shame it didn’t work for Schofield but after nine games and only one (fortunate) win it was pretty clear that things were only going one way.So now we must look to the future and consider who will replace Schofield. The bookmakers think they know, as David Wagner is the odds on favourite, though it might not be quite as straightforward as that. For starters, I can’t see how Wagner would agree to working under a Head of Football like Leigh Bromby. A central th...

Sep132022 by Terrier Spirit3 Comments

Predicted Huddersfield Town XI to take on Wigan – Will Town’s two new boys start?

Matches

Town are back in action again tonight after the unexpected pause in their season following the Queen's death last week. I'd rather the weekend's games had gone ahead with an appropriate tribute to the Queen's life before kickoff but given the game we had called off was a tricky away fixture to QPR, Danny Schofield might have been privately relieved to have missed a fixture where defeat would have piled pressure onto him. Instead he goes into this week with two home games before the international break and has a chance to show that he can get this team playing. Wigan and Cardiff are both teams that can be tricky on their day but aren't exactly world beaters, so four points and a significant improvement in performance should be the minimum expectation for this week given Town are current...

Sep52022 by Terrier Spirit18 Comments

It’s not time to sack Schofield…yet, Huddersfield Town are not too good to go down, empty seats, some positives – Notes on defeat to Blackpool

Matches

Huddersfield Town were once more the victims of refereeing technology failing spectacularly. While the failure of VAR to pick up two blatant penalties in the playoff final may have cost us hundreds of millions of pounds and a place in the Premier League (yes, I'm still not over it), yesterday's goal line technology malfunction merely cost us a goal which could have earned us a Championship point. The stakes were lower but the error was far more blatant and ultimately it could end up being a factor in how long Danny Schofield stays in his job. The goal that wasn't allowed has to be the first thing that is discussed but in fairness, Huddersfield Town were once again poor and struggled with all the same issues that have led to them having such a poor start to the season. So while we can cu...

Sep32022 by Terrier Spirit28 Comments

Thoughts on Huddersfield Town’s transfer ins and outs, defeat to Bristol City and their crucial game against Blackpool

Matches, Opinion, Transfers

I’ve always thought that if you’re scrambling around on transfer deadline day to get your business done then you’ve done something wrong. So maybe we shouldn’t be quite so delighted with the flurry of activity that Town saw at Canalside on Thursday as the deadline approached. Three new players came through the door as even more were ushered out on loan. In this article I’ll work my through the various deals that took place and then summarise a few of my thoughts on the defeat to Bristol City. I think the transfer news is probably more important than the defeat now, as the game has passed now and is probably not one Town fans want to spend a lot of time thinking about and at least the signings offer a little bit of hope! Michal Helik on a permanent deal from Barnsley I think this ...