Huddersfield Town lost by a single goal to Wycombe on Tuesdays night, as Udoh’s goal was enough to separate the two teams. While the result was terrible for Town’s promotion prospects, there were signs of improvement. Too little, too late, but it was still pleasing to see the team looking more coherent even if some familiar problems prevented us from getting anything from the game.
With Town now four points and two league positions away from sixth place, it looks very hard for us to close this gap on the two teams above us. Particularly as both Bolton and Reading have relatively kind run-ins.
Mistakes and lack of cutting edge cost Town again
Despite Wycombe being one of the best attacking teams in League One this season, the game was settled by a goal that came from a defensive blunder. Josh Ruffels actually did pretty well against an excellent front two of Kone and Udoh but a momentary lapse saw him miscontrol the ball straight into the path of one striker who passed it to his strike partner to curl it in from range. Ruffels wasn’t the only player at fault, as Pearson didn’t do enough to close down the shot and Nicholls was uncharacteristically slow to get down to the low strike.
It was a bit of a freak moment from Ruffels but it’s hard not to wonder if we might have managed better in this game with an established central defender rather than a left back that’s trying his best. We’ve missed Helik a great deal since his January exit but I suppose Lees, Spencer, Lonwijk and Balker are all either permanently injured or struggling for fitness. So it’s a combination of bad luck and poor transfer dealings that have got us here.
Town only managed two shots on target in this game, after having the same number against Mansfield and none against Lincoln. Four shots on target in our last three games is a miserable return. Even more so when Worthington’s stated ambition for his spell was to help the team play with more freedom and attacking verve.
The lack of creativity at Huddersfield Town feels like an ongoing crisis. Even when we’ve been good we’ve rarely been prolific in the last ten seasons or so. Up until recently we bemoaned (quite rightly) the lack of decent strikers at the club but now we’ve invested in this area the problem persists because we aren’t playing in a way that gives our strikers any chance.
The ongoing problem of going long to a tiny striker continued into his game. With Wycombe’s central defenders being almost giants, they must have been delighted to nod away our repeated attempts to play it long to our strikers. Joe Taylor struggled with this more than Charles and once again looked very frustrated on the pitch. I can’t blame him though, it feels like we’ve bought a Ferrari and are confused why it’s no good at off-roading and keeps getting stuck in the mud. Taylor looks lightning quick but we only see it when he’s chasing down defenders because nobody ever plays the kind of through balls that he would thrive off.
An improved performance
Outside the final third, I thought Town looked pretty good in this game. Wycombe are out of sorts at the moment but still represent a difficult challenge and we pretty much matched them in open play.
Our crossing was often poor and either lobbed up for their tall players to easily deal with or smashed into that box without a lot to where Town players might be located. Then again, against Mansfield we weren’t stringing enough passes together to get to the crossing stage, so there was an improvement with our approach play.
Barring one moment when they scored, we looked pretty solid defensively too. Pearson and Ruffels had tough assignments but I think both of them did relatively well when you consider Kone attracted £5m+ bids in January and Udoh also looked dangerous throughout.
As pundits love to tell us, this stage of the season is more about results than decent performances but I think we needed to get through this game and be able to hold our heads high, which I think the team managed in spite of the defeat.
Playoffs now a distant prospect
Han Solo memorably told C3PO, “Never tell me the odds!” in Empire Strikes back. If you don’t want to know the odds for Town going up then look away now. With that said, the latest odds I could find put Town down as a 14/1 shot to go up this season. This seems long given we’re only four points off the playoffs but maybe not, because there’s not a chance I would put any money on this team going up.
One way of looking at it is that Town have to win a mini-league of three to even scrape into the playoffs. Then they’d have to win the playoffs. With an inexperienced head coach. And a squad of players that have a questionable mentality. And a load of ongoing injury problems. With a team that doesn’t have a developed style of play. Who’s fans are openly protesting against the club’s leadership at every game. Apart from the huge chunk of fans that aren’t even bothering to turn up to protest. And our form since Christmas has been dreadful.
What now for Town…
Well, if you’ve read the above paragraph you can probably sense my optimism is at an all-time low. Trying to look on the bright side, our next two matches should be winnable. While Town have proved themselves capable of losing to bad teams almost as often as they lose to good teams, if we can’t beat Burton Albion and Cambridge United then we have no right to be in the playoffs. Stockport away looks very tricky and would be my guess for the point when we properly give up hope on the playoffs. Then Exeter away is another one that a team planning to storm the playoffs should win without too much issue. Then the final game of the season is Leyton Orient at home, which looks tricky on paper but it’s impossible to know what the stakes will be for this game. If we need something to get sixth and Leyton Orient have nothing to play for, it might not be as hard as it looks.
Of the five remaining games, my guess would be that we’ll need to win four or maybe even all five to be in with a serious chance of taking sixth spot. Reading and Bolton have relatively kind fixtures ahead of them, so it may be hard to overtake both of them without winning up.
I think injuries played a big part in our season but, in my opinion, a big turning point to our season was not replacing Helik in January.
Never having seen a league game – and just relying on your cogent analysis through the season – they are just about where I expected them to be – or even above – given a team that hasn’t the skills for the type of game they were trying to play, and who no longer really know what game that is.
They cant keep a clean sheet, and they cant score goals. Otherwise everything’s fine.
You have to be admired for continuing to do what you do.
Thanks.
‘If they reach the play offs I’ll eat my hat’
That Ferrari looks a bit on the flabby side to me.
Thanks for article TS. Always look forward to reading your thoughts on our club.
The recent games against Wrexham and Wycombe promised and possibly deserved more than the results but showed again where Town have been utterly lacking in front of goal where it matters. The story of our season.
We have missed Helik so much along with Miller who added a bright spark on return.
Can only hope for a genuinely decent appointment of new backroom/recruitment and coach/manager to make more of retained players. I do like Jon Worthington but hope (for his sake) he doesn’t want to continue further (unless some sort of miracle occurs on the pitch in the remaining games).