Blog – Page 52 – Terrier Spirit – Huddersfield Town FC blog

Nov12018 by Terrier SpiritNo Comments

Huddersfield Town’s past three Novembers… and why we need to break the trend

Opinion

It's not true to say Huddersfield Town have a “November curse”, but Town have endured poor results in all three Novembers that David Wagner has taken charge. With Town starting November 2018 at the bottom of the Premier League it’s going to be vital that he overturns this strange record of struggling as the nights start to draw in. As it stands Huddersfield Town have a November record of played ten, won one, drawn one, lost eight in the David Wagner era. Here’s a look at how the last three Novembers have played out for Town... A battling victory followed by three defeats - 2017/18 season Last November Town won their first game of the month against West Brom, in a game where Town dominated until Christopher Schindler was sent off for a second booking. There was then a backs-to-the-wall...

Oct272018 by Terrier Spirit4 Comments

Watford 3-0 Huddersfield – Player ratings after a dismal defeat

Matches, Opinion

After a series of promising performances without a win to show from them, Huddersfield Town hoped something would change against Watford. Sadly it did, rather than playing well and losing we changed to playing poorly and losing. Most of our recent defeats have had a "What if..." feeling to them, where we've blamed our bad luck, bad referees, and too much paint on the goalposts denying Town. Against Watford we just weren't good enough. There were brief flashes of promise, but generally it was a poor performance, and too many players had bad games. Here's exactly what I thought of each of Town's players... Jonas Lössl - 5 out of 10 Couldn’t do much about the first goal, but may feel like he should have saved the second, which was fired in from a tight angle. A last ditch clearance avoid...

Oct152018 by Terrier Spirit3 Comments

Three reasons to believe Huddersfield Town’s season is about to turn around

Opinion

Town managed to come away from Burnley with a point last weekend, which was far better than most hoped for before the game. However, it felt like an opportunity missed rather than a valuable away point, given how well Town performed and the chances we spurned. This was a feeling that we've become used to this season as Town fans. The performances in general haven’t been nearly as bad as the results suggest. You could take this as a cause for optimism or concern, depending on your outlook. It’s a positive that the performance levels are decent and surely our luck will soon turn. Alternatively, we can’t win games even when we play well, so what chance do we have? I’m an eternal optimist when it comes to Town, so here are some of the reasons I think we’re getting close to the end of our...

Sep242018 by Terrier Spirit6 Comments

The 3 basic mistakes that led to Huddersfield Town’s 3-1 defeat to Leicester

Matches, Opinion

Huddersfield Town were defeated 3-1 by Leicester City, in a match that Town were punished for a series of silly mistakes. While we also spurned good opportunities at the other end, I’ll remember this game for how easily we let our opponents score against us. Here are my thoughts on the individual errors that led to the goals... Erik Durm has a rush of blood to the head Leicester first goal was the sort that you don’t see many teams concede. Town had a corner but contrived to turn our advantage to Leicester having three players running clear through on our goal. There were a few people you could point the finger at for this goal, but the biggest error came from Erik Durm. He was one of the players hanging back to defend against the counter, and left his post to intercept a loose bal...

Sep182018 by Terrier Spirit8 Comments

4 thoughts about Huddersfield Town’s 1-0 defeat to Crystal Palace

Matches, Opinion

Huddersfield Town lost 1-0 to Crystal Palace at the weekend, in a result that David Wagner described as "unlucky". Town dominated possession, created several quality chances, but weren’t able to find a cutting edge in front of goal. Crystal Palace looked pretty average and Town played the better football, but Wilfried Zaha scored an individual goal that proved to be the difference between the two teams. Zaha needs to look in the mirror I get the feeling that Wilfried Zaha came into this game with an agenda to complain about the slightest bit of contact and try to get opposition players sent off. The only bad tackle he received was when Zanka was rightly booked for a poorly-timed tackle. Zaha’s post-match comments suggested he’s the victim of some widespread conspiracy to not send off ...

Sep152018 by Terrier Spirit4 Comments

Selection headaches facing David Wagner against Crystal Palace

Matches

After a seemingly endless international break, Huddersfield Town return to Premier League action against Crystal Palace later today. Town’s last game was a promising performance against Everton, but we're still waiting for our first victory of the season. A key part of getting a good result against Palace will be to get the team selection right. Here are a few of the tricky decisions David Wagner is facing when he picks his team… How does Kongolo fit into the defence? Terence Kongolo has been one of the standout players for Town so far this season, so it seems unthinkable to drop him. However, it also seems unlikely that the pairing of Zanka and Schindler would be broken up either. The lack of a high-quality left-back allowed the option of playing Kongolo in his less favoured posit...

Sep12018 by Terrier Spirit1 Comment

Everton 1-1 Huddersfield Town: Player ratings – Billing receives the top score

Matches, Opinion

Huddersfield Town fought hard at Goodison Park and made life difficult for Everton, earning a respectable point against a team that probably expected an easy win. This was a huge improvement on recent performances and showed a return of the “Terrier Spirit” that we’ve all been missing. It was a bad day at the office for Everton, but part of that was down to Town not letting them play. This was the best performance from Town I’ve seen this season and fully deserved a point. Here’s what I thought of Town’s individual players today… Jonas Lössl - 6 out of 10 Everton only managed one shot on target all game, so it was a surprisingly quiet afternoon for the Danish keeper. It was a pretty solid return to the starting lineup for Lössl, with some good distribution to start counter-attacks....

Sep12018 by Terrier SpiritNo Comments

Predicted team for Town’s trip to Everton – Will Wagner let the Terriers off the leash?

Matches

Huddersfield Town travel to Goodison Park to take on Everton today. It’s a game that gives Town an opportunity to turn around their recent poor form and get their first win of the season under their belt. Everton won’t be easy to beat though, as they’re enjoying a honeymoon period under new manager, Marco Silva. Here’s how I think Town will line up for the game… Tactics: 4-2-3-1 David Wagner may be tempted to try a more defensive lineup and to look to contain Everton, but I hope he does the opposite. We need to build our confidence, and a tedious 0-0 won’t provide that. We need to go for the throat from the first whistle and not let Everton settle for a moment. That’s why I think we need to play 4-2-3-1, which two proper wingers and a number ten behind the main striker. Everton’s p...

Aug312018 by Terrier Spirit1 Comment

The problems Huddersfield Town are currently facing

Opinion

Huddersfield Town have had a poor start to their 2018/19 season, with three defeats and one draw from their opening four games. Admittedly, two of those losses came against top-six opposition, but performances in those games was disappointing even when you account for the opposition. Losing is fine, but rolling over and letting them tickle your belly is less acceptable. In this article I’m going to try to pinpoint where the problems currently lie for Town and David Wagner. This isn’t an article that’s moaning about our current situation, rather I’m trying to find what the problems are and then it may be easier to see how we can turn this slump around. Lack of goals Obviously scoring goals is the principle problem facing any football team, but a lack of goals has been an issue for Town...

Aug262018 by Terrier Spirit8 Comments

Huddersfield Town 0-0 Cardiff City – Player ratings (One player gets 2/10)

Matches

Huddersfield Town and Cardiff City played out a drab goalless draw, where there were few chances and the main talking point was Jonathan Hogg’s red card. Before the game it had been billed as the start of our season, but it felt more like a false start. Here’s my player ratings from the game… Ben Hamer - N/A A defensive mixup early on meant he had to rush out and got tangled up with an onrushing Cardiff played. Had to come off injured too early to give him a score for this game. Terence Kongolo - 8 out of 10 I’ve been critical of Kongolo’s attacking ability when he’s playing as a leftback, but he was great against Cardiff. He made some excellent tackles in defense, but he really shone when going forward and was the only Town player that looked capable of getting through Cardiff’s de...