Low blocks, soggy towels, pointy elbows, Fiver Fans, a wardrobe on legs and promotion dreams – Notes on Town’s late win against Cardiff

Huddersfield Town beat Cardiff last night in a game that had a boring start and middle but a thrilling end. Cardiff were the better team for long periods, soaking up pressure with little problem and being a threat on the break, but Town managed to find a way through them late in the game and two goals in quick succession meant Cardiff left the John Smiths’ Stadium empty handed.

Here a few of my thoughts on the game. 

Low block problems eventually overcome

I wrote before the game about how Town struggle against teams like Cardiff, so it wasn’t a huge surprise to see Town Gissing the ball with 70% possession in the first half but failing to create a meaningful chance. While Cardiff sat back, soaked up whatever we threw at them and then picked us off on the break. Nicholls came to the rescue again and kept us in the game with some decent saves from the decent chances Cardiff managed to carve out.

I didn’t expect an easy game against Cardiff but I did expect to see Town show a bit more creativity and skill in the final third. The first 45 minutes were pretty grim to watch from a Town perspective and none of our players seemed capable of receiving the ball in tight spaces or creating chances. Instead we found attacks breaking down in the early stages because we ran down blind alleys, couldn’t control the ball or were wayward with our passing. 

It’s not easy to play against a team that sets up to defend, as Town proved against Fulham last weekend, but it wasn’t until the second half that we started to look a threat. I’m not sure what changed but we managed to get Sorba Thomas on the ball higher up the pitch and he put in a huge number of crosses. 

At least we found a way to get through them in the end. Going behind seemed to be the biggest catalyst for Town’s improved play. Realising that we were going to lose the game unless we did something seemed to add the required urgency to our build up play and Cardiff started to crumble. I suppose Carel Eiting’s addition to the midfield, Jordan Rhodes partnering Ward up front and Jon Russell pushing forward also gave us a bit more cutting edge with our passing and more to aim for in the box. 

Towels and time-wasting 

I’m a bit baffled about the towel situation last night. When Town had corners, Sorba Thomas used his own shirt to dry the ball before taking a kick but whenever Cardiff had a long throw opportunity a (presumably soaking wet) towel materialised out of nowhere. I’m used to seeing home sides have towels strategically distributed for their long throw merchant to use but I can’t remember an away side doing this. 

Surely one of the elements of home advantage is that the away team can’t set things up just how they like them. Why didn’t Town’s ball boys remove the towels and make life a bit harder for Cardiff? Maybe that’s a bit petty but surely we need to look for every little advantage possible and Cardiff used their rigorous towelling of the ball as one of their many time-wasting strategies.

While we’re on the subject of time wasting, Cardiff were pretty rotten for running the clock down at every opportunity. This is unquestionably the pot calling the kettle black, as Town have been masters of time wasting at times this season. Lee Nicholls is the Grand Wizard of Slow Dead Balls, so I appreciate the hypocrisy on display. 

Ultimately, it was Cardiff’s time wasting and Jordan Huggill’s nasty elbow on Lees that led to a huge amount of added time being played and set up Town for their 96th-minute winner. The fact that Town were able to give Cardiff a taste of their own medicine in those closing moments by running the clock down in the corner made the victory all the sweeter. A highlight of the evening came when Sorba Thomas took forever over a throw, including shaking the ball boy’s hand in his repertoire of small delays.

Jon Russell is immense 

Eyebrows were raised at 6.45pm when Russell retained his place in the starting eleven but Hogg was on the bench. It was a gamble by Corberan but his faith was repaid by another very solid display from Russell which was capped off with scoring the winning goal. 

While the headlines will focus on his goalscoring heroics, his all round play was very impressive and he protected the defence and distributed the ball very nicely. It’s far too early to write Hogg off, but it feels like the defensive midfield role is now Russell’s to lose and I can imagine him keeping his place in the starting lineup for now.

I talked in my player ratings about how good he is at buying himself time on the ball with little nudges of the ball into space but I didn’t talk about how well he uses his huge frame. He’s built like a wardrobe sat on a thick pair of legs and he gets his body between defenders and the ball so well. He’s not quick but he doesn’t have to be when he can use his strength to seat away players trying to get the ball off him.

The Examiner podcast pointed out earlier in the week that Jon Russell is playing far better in the first team than he has in the B Team games they’d seen him play. I wonder if he’s just better suited to the cut and thrust of competitive football or if he’s maybe playing out of his skin and he’ll return back to his usual level soon. 

Similar comments were made about how Sorba Thomas couldn’t consistently perform in the Championship after coming out of non-league and he’s proved his doubters wrong. Russell could be the  next success story for the recruitment team as he looks like he’s more than capable of holding his own in the Championship.

Hugill assault on Lees and more yellow than a field of daffodils 

I had a fairly good view of Jordan Hugill’s elbow on Tom Lees late in the second half and I think he’s very lucky to have escaped a straight red. He had his elbow in a completely unnatural position and was aware that Lees was closing in on him. I saw it as a deliberate attempt to hurt another player and he should have been sent off for it. 

The panto villain routine from Hugill while Lees was receiving treatment was particularly distasteful. Protesting your innocence is a lot harder when the player you elbowed has blood pouring out of his face. The decision to sub him straight after this incident makes me think Morrison knew Hugill was lucky to still be on the pitch.

It wasn’t just one player though, Cardiff were one of the dirtiest teams we’ve had at the Johns Smith’s Stadium this season. They received seven yellow cards on the night and put in some unpleasant challenges. While they have a reputation for being a tough, physical side, it was disappointing to see them resort to hacking players down when promising breaks were developing for Town. Thomas and O’Brien both seemed to be targeted and will no doubt be nursing bruises today. 

A bumper crowd makes a difference

Dean Hoyle made his fortune selling cheap birthday cards in high quantities, so it’s consistent that he should want to fill the stadium by selling cheap tickets and the strategy paid off last night. Having more fans in the ground improved the atmosphere and helped push the team on to victory. Listening to John Russell’s post-match interview showed how much the support helped him keep pushing in the final moments.

As a season ticket holder it would be easy to grumble that cheap tickets for floating fans mean they’re getting a better deal than the diehard fans but I think it’s a sensible ploy. The occasional fans that started following Town in the Premier League days have all gone and our attendances are mostly made up of the hard core followers. Luring back fans that make the odd match is a good way to hook them in to coming to Town and thankfully they (eventually) saw Town put in a decent performance. 

Those “Fiver Fans” will hopefully have seen enough of what’s happening with Town this season to want to come along when tickets aren’t being given away on the cheap. While they shouldn’t expect last gasp winners every game, they will hopefully appreciate that Town now have a team of players that put everything into every game and that, for me, is more important than playing beautiful football.

Are we really “on our way”?

I’ve thought that Town have been in a false position in the league for most of the season but there has to come a time when I admit that we deserve to be where we are. We’ve been more consistent than the teams below us and have accumulated more points. We deserve to be in the play off positions and all we have to do is to carry on playing like we have been and we can finish in the top six.

It was unthinkable that we might be playoff contenders at the start of the season but expectations have changed now and it’s a real possibility. While teams below us could win their games in hand and see us slide down the table, it’s very unlikely (maybe impossible depending on the fixtures) they’ll ALL win those games. 

If we can hold on to our top six position it then becomes interesting to think about how we might cope in the playoffs. We’d certainly go in as the underdogs and with very little pressure. That would count in our favour. We’ve also got one of the best track records in the playoffs in the football league. 

It’s too early to get carried away but it’s lovely to be able to dream.