Opinion – Page 5 – Terrier Spirit – Huddersfield Town FC blog

Jun132022 by Terrier Spirit1 Comment

Rule change could be good news for Town’s glut of young talent

Opinion

It was announced last week that the upcoming Championship season will see teams allowed up to five substitutions to be made in any game. The rule change will allow teams make more changes to their lineups mid-game and the team that finishes the game will often only feature half of the outfield players that started the game. In this article I’m going to dig into why this change could be good news for Town’s younger players, particularly those that are close to breaking into the first team but aren’t quite there yet. What exactly are the new Championship rules on substitutions? The headline change is that you can now make five changes instead of three but it’s not quite that simple. You can still only stop the game for substitutions three times, so if you don’t make any ...

May252022 by Terrier Spirit3 Comments

Town fans beware: Sneaky Forest fans are trying to get tickets in our side of Wembley

News, Opinion

Notthingham Forest have sold out their allocation for the playoff final on Sunday and many of their fans have been left without a ticket. Some of these frustrated fans are living up to their nickname of the Tricky Trees, as they have taken to social media to try and con Huddersfield Town fans into buying them tickets. We have not yet sold out our allocation and tickets are on general sale for anyone who wants one, with one significant caveat. You can only buy a ticket in the Town end if you have previous booking history on the Huddersfield Town system. This measure is there to weed out cheeky Forest fans, though many are trying to circumvent this by getting Town fans to buy them tickets. Why are Forest fans trying to get tickets in the Huddersfield Town end of Wembley? There have ...

May222022 by Terrier Spirit4 Comments

A Wembley myth – Town and Forest’s players have nothing to fear with the pitch

News, Opinion

I can’t count the number of times that I’ve heard people talk about the intimidating size of the Wembley pitch. The energy-sapping nature of covering all that extra ground compared to the piddly size of a regular pitch. How defensive teams struggle to cover the extra space in behind them on the mammoth pitch at Wembley. But it’s just not true. The dimensions of the pitch at Wembley are actually very similar to just about every other pitch at major English football grounds. I find it a bit strange that there’s any latitude at all in pitch dimensions, though it does allow clubs to have even more of a home advantage by customising the size of their pitch to their style of play. While pitch sizes do vary from one ground to the next, Wembley stadium is completely average when compared to...

Apr272022 by Terrier Spirit9 Comments

Would promotion to the Premier League be a good thing for Huddersfield Town?

Opinion

Huddersfield Town were everyone's pick for relegation favourites earlier this season and few Town fans grumbled because they expected much the same. So it's marvelous to be looking forward to a playoff campaign in a few weeks time, especially as Town have qualified with two games to spare. I've said in the past that I don't really want Town to go up this season because our relegation season in the Premier League was so miserable and I wouldn’t want to spend a year being the whipping boys again. In an attempt to change my own mind, I'm going to write about all the reasons promotion will be a good thing for Huddersfield Town. This squad has defied expectations and could do so again One of my big concerns about going up is the possibility of having to overhaul the squad t...

Dec232021 by Terrier Spirit5 Comments

Sorba Thomas to Watford rumour – A Huddersfield Town fan’s view

Opinion, Transfers

There were reports earlier this week that Watford may be considering a move for Sorba Thomas after his impressive season so far for Huddersfield Town. The stats he's been producing in the Championship, particularly in the first few months of the season, have been amazing and he's also earned his first few call ups to the Welsh national team. It's no huge surprise that the former Boreham Wood player is generating interest from Premier League clubs and it's possible several other clubs are keeping tabs on him. Here are a few of my opinions about Sorba Thomas and this rumour. Sorba's ridiculous start to the season Prior to this season, Huddersfield Town have had a long standing problem with set pieces. Even in our promotion and Premier League survival campaigns we had a tendenc...

Dec132021 by Terrier Spirit7 Comments

Asking for trouble, stale tactics, lacking ambition, Carlos’ job security and unexpected stats ‐ Notes on the draw with Coventry

Matches, Opinion

Despite getting a draw against one of the league's better teams on Saturday, I was left with a bitter taste after sitting through the game. Despite Town's respectable league position, alarm bells are ringing for many fans and it feels like we're a team on the slide. Coventry played fairly well but most teams would have when their opponent allowed them so much time on the ball and space to get away shots at will. Had Coventry been slightly clinical with their finishing we could have been hammered in this game. Though if Matty Pearson had nodded home his straightforward chance in the second half we would almost certainly have gone on to win, so it's not worth dwelling on hypothetical too much. Here are a few more of my thoughts on the game: Defending a lead badly ...

Aug52021 by Terrier Spirit1 Comment

7 reasons to be pessimistic about Huddersfield Town’s chances this season

Opinion

Yesterday’s article looked at all the reasons to feel positive about Huddersfield Town’s chances this season and by the time I’d finished writing it I’d almost convinced myself that we might be OK this season. So much so that I was tempted to not bother to write a more pessimistic preview of the season. But most Town fans will have experienced the wild mood swings that following can provoke. A decent win on a Tuesday night and you look up the table and think another three more victories could put us in the playoff hunt and then a defeat on the following Saturday leaves you wondering if this sorry team will ever win a match again. So I’m going to indulge my negative side in this article and look at all the reasons why it’s probably best to not expect too much from Huddersfield Town ...

Aug42021 by Terrier Spirit7 Comments

6 reasons to feel optimistic about Huddersfield Town’s chances this season

Opinion

The Championship season is due to start on Saturday and it feels about the right time to put together a preview of Huddersfield Town’s chances this time around. As has become a tradition on this blog, I am writing two completely contradictory previews - this is the positive, happy-clappy one. The miserable one will follow later this week. (As an aside, the miserable preview in previous years has usually had over double the number of views as the optimistic one. Which tells you everything you need to know about Town fans!) Regardless of the typically dour outlook of many Town fans, I’m going to try and make a case for why we should feel at least somewhat optimistic about this season. Prepare for the sound of barrels being scraped and levels of optimism that are bordering on sociopathic! ...

May42021 by Terrier Spirit15 Comments

Baffling formations, repeating mistakes, dissecting their goal, limping over the line and thinking about summer – Notes on Town’s 1-1 draw with Coventry

Matches, Opinion

It's a couple of days since Town's 1-1 draw with Coventry and it's already a struggle to remember anything of great consequence from the game. Despite this season being exceptional for off the pitch reasons, we had to sit through another unexceptional Town performance where a point was a little bit fortunate. All the usual problems reared their head during the game and it was only results elsewhere that guaranteed Town's safety. In previous seasons beating the drop had been something to celebrate but this time it's slightly embarrassing as it doesn't feel like we deserve to survive after a woeful 2021. Playing three or four different formations at once Could you confidently say what the formation was for Town on Saturday? I was preoccupied by this question for long spe...

Apr172021 by Terrier Spirit4 Comments

Phil Hodgkinson strikes the right tone in his update but needs to now follow through on his promises

News, Opinion

Because of how our brains work, this article would get more clicks if the title was highly critical of Phil Hodgkinson. But his latest update it was actually a well-judged and informative statement which avoided some of his past mistakes of over promising but still offered some hope to fans. This is an improvement over Mark Devlin's thoroughly depressing recent statements about it taking three to five years for Town to feel capable of competing at the top end of the Championship. Here's a quick summary of what the statement said and some of my thoughts on it… What was actually said in the statement? Of course your best bet is to read the full statement on the club's website but here's a bullet point summary of what was said: Effusive praise for people who bought season ticket...