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Washing off the stench of relegation – 6 thoughts about Town’s win over West Brom

Washing off the stench of relegation – 6 thoughts about Town’s win over West Brom

Matches
Huddersfield Town beat West Brom 2-1 last night, making them almost certain to retain their Championship status. It was a remarkable performance from Town, with every player contributing well and pulling together when it really counted. Here are a few of my thoughts about the game: Awful officials One thing I'd like to get out of the way early is how bad the officials were last night. Chalobah was booked after 18 minutes for time wasting, which I don't think I've ever seen before. I can understand the desire for the ref to speed up play but surely a quick word would have worked. Instead he left a defender one mistimed tackle away from red with 72 minutes still to play. It seemed petty, which summed up his general approach to the game. The biggest two errors made by the officials came a lit...
5 things to look out for in the Huddersfield Town v West Brom game

5 things to look out for in the Huddersfield Town v West Brom game

Matches
Huddersfield Town take on West Bromwich Albion tonight in a game with huge implications for the top and bottom of the Championship table. West Brom need a win to avoid Brentford pushing them out of the automatic promotion spot. Town are fighting for their survival, with a win likely to see them safe and anything less leaving them sweating on other results. Here are a few things to look out for in tonight's game... Will Town play for a draw? Town have managed three nil-nil draws in lockdown so far and another tonight, though dire to watch, would put them in a much stronger position in the league. Not safe but far more likely to not need anything from our final game at Millwall. Given West Brom have a much better team than Town and have played better football, I suspect Danny Cowley won...
Survival maths – What has to happen for Huddersfield Town to stay up?

Survival maths – What has to happen for Huddersfield Town to stay up?

Matches
If Frazier Cambell had scored the glorious chance he had to win the game against Sheffield Wednesday the other night then this blogpost wouldn’t have been written. Instead we could all have accepted that Town were most likely safe and turned our attention to how we can turn things around next season and avoid another relegation scrap. But, unfortunately, the chance was missed and now I’m spending an unhealthy amount of time looking at the league table and the list of remaining Championship fixtures. To try and make sense of the permutations, I’ve gone through the various possible scenarios to see what has to happen for Town to survive. Clearly the ambition for Town has to be to get a win or two in our last couple of games and go up without sweating on other teams’ results. In reality it ...
“Lots of huffing and puffing without any end product” Player ratings after 0-0 with Sheffield Wednesday

“Lots of huffing and puffing without any end product” Player ratings after 0-0 with Sheffield Wednesday

Matches
Huddersfield Town managed to play out another joyless stalemate last night, this time against Sheffield Wednesday. The players showed more desire and determination than they had against Luton last week but did not have the creativity to break open Sheffield’s resolute defence. The result was frustrating but could end up being a vital point in our survival bid. Some players did significantly better than others. Here’s how I rate their performances. Lössl - 9 out of 10 The diving, fingertip save from Kadeem Harris’ curling long-range effort was the highlight of the evening. It was a truly magnificent save, full stretch and strong enough fingers to get just enough on the ball to spin it past the post. It was the best individual moment produced by a Town player on the night and Lössl’s seco...
Predicted Huddersfield Town XI to take on Sheffield Wednesday

Predicted Huddersfield Town XI to take on Sheffield Wednesday

Matches
Huddersfield Town have another chance to steer themselves clear of relegation worries against Sheffield Wednesday tonight. After the bitter disappointment of last Friday's loss to Luton, it's vital that Danny Cowley selects the right starting eleven. Here is how I would have them lining up tonight if it were up to me. Goalkeeper - Lössl My personal opinion is that keepers should nearly always come out for balls in their 6 years box, so it was disappointing to see him stuck to his line when Luton scored their opener on Friday. While Schindler was most obviously to blame for that goal, the whole situation could have been avoided if Lössl had been more confident. Having said that, we have few other viable options given how long it is since Coleman has played a game and I think Schofield i...
Will Danny Cowley unleash his Hillsborough hero on Tuesday night?

Will Danny Cowley unleash his Hillsborough hero on Tuesday night?

Matches
On Wednesday 17th May 2017 at around ten past nine Town were about to lose their playoff final against Sheffield Wednesday. Steven Fletcher had scored the opening goal on fifty minutes and since then Owls fans had been waving their phone torches around and planning their trip to Wembley for the final. Town were probing away at Wednesday but did not look particularly threatening. Then David Wagner rolled the dice and threw Collin Quaner into the fray. He entered the field with 71 minutes gone in the game. After 72 minutes the sold out away end was in hysterics after an unlikely equaliser was bundled into the net by Wednesday’s Tom Lees. Nahki Wells was the last Town player to touch the ball but the principle reason that goal was scored was the tenacity and raw energy of Big Col. Izzy Brown...
Should Danny Cowley be sacked as Huddersfield Town manager?

Should Danny Cowley be sacked as Huddersfield Town manager?

Matches
No. Danny Cowley deserves to keep his job. Here are my reasons why... He inherited a mess It was well documented that Danny Cowley turned down the Town job when he was first approached. Despite a rumour that our offer would increase his salary by a factor of 10 he still said no. Imagine howtoxic Town must have looked to be able to initially walk away from adding an extra zero to your earnings. It's clear Cowley turned down the initial approach because the club was so obviously in a negative spiral and had not yet hit the bottom (despite being bottom end of the league at the time). Cowley is notorious for carrying out detailed opposition research. So he will have discovered, when researching for Lincoln's League Cup trip to Huddersfield, just how crap our team were. He’ll have known tha...
4 theories about why Town were so poor against Luton

4 theories about why Town were so poor against Luton

Matches
Last night Huddersfield Town were beaten 2-0 by Luton Town after putting in one of their worst performances of the season. The game was billed as a decisive one for our season yet the players failed to find any fluency or spirit and were deservedly beaten. Fingers were being pointed all over the place on social media, clambering for an answer to why Town have been so poor in big games. I honestly don’t know the reason but I have a few ideas. I suspect we will never truly know what is the biggest factor in Town’s awful performance against Luton but here are a few thoughts of mine... Too many players that won’t be here next year Town's starting eleven against Luton featured four loan players (Lossl, Chalobah, Smith Rowe, Willock), one player that's already signed for another club next season...
Predicted starting XI for Huddersfield Town v Luton

Predicted starting XI for Huddersfield Town v Luton

Matches
Huddersfield Town face a huge game against Luton tonight, where victory will see us all but safe from relegation and defeat would plunge Town right into the scrap at the bottom of the table. Getting the team selection right will be tricky for Danny Cowley as he has to balance picking the best players against avoiding injury to those that have played the majority of our recent games. This game, in theory at least, represents the easiest opportunity to notch up a win out of the remaining four. There's an argument that picking the strongest possible team makes sense as rotation will be possible without consequence once we've got to the 50 points. Here's who I would pick for tonight's game: Goalkeeper: Lössl While Grabara had some good games in his loan spell this season, we have looked a...

Which 7 Huddersfield Town players are at risk of burnout?

Matches
Town have played four games in a short space of time and have another five to go before the end of the season. With all this talk about injuries accumulating because of the short turn around time between games, I thought I would take a look at which members of Town’s squad have played the most minutes so far and are therefore at risk of burning out. Danny Cowley has been careful to rotate his squad wherever possible but there are a few key positions where he has tended to stick with the same personnel. The difficulty will come if any of these key players play too much football and either pick up an injury or are too tired to perform because of their heavy workload. Which players have played every minute so far? Three players have played every minute so far: Lössl Schindler ...