Huddersfield Town head to Birmingham tonight for another Friday night game. After seemingly never playing on Saturdays at three in the latter half of last season, we’ve had our first two fixtures of this season moved to Friday nights too. As much as football under the floodlights has a certain kind of appeal, I’ll be pleased once we get back to playing most of our games on Saturdays.
Tonight’s team selection has a bit more riding on it than usual as most people felt that Danny Schofield got it wrong last week. I’m less inclined to say that as I predicted the exact starting eleven but Schofield does need to make sure he doesn’t repeat the same mistakes again tonight. With that in mind, I think we’ll see a bit more attacking flair but I don’t think there will be huge changes to the defence that only conceded a single goal last week despite having to withstand a lot of pressure.
Goalkeeper: Nicholls
Obviously it’ll be Nicholls in goals again. He’s clearly our number one. Interestingly though, our number two keeper last weekend was Chapman, the young Aussie keeper in the B Team. Ryan Schofield played in the B Team this week and the group training with Paul Clements in the club’s training video had five keepers in it. That seems too many, making me think a couple could be going out on loan before long. Very little has been said about Schofield since his return from injury but I think it may be the plan to get him out on a season-long loan to build up his confidence away from the club.
Defence: Turton, Edmonds-Green, Lees, Ruffels
After a poor showing last week, it may seem like an odd choice to persist with the same back four but I think it might be better to keep this defence together and to let them spend more time getting familiar with each other. There were definitely areas to improve last week but I thought that all four of the back line showed enough to keep them in the team and let them build up their relationships.
Pearson’s long term absence at the back means that Edmonds-Green could get a lot more game time than he was otherwise likely to get this season if he takes his opportunity but if he doesn’t impress then it could nudge the club towards dipping into the transfer market.
Ruffels has a similar audition for the leftback role but also has the prospect of Nakayama breathing down his neck. He was probably the weakest link in our back line last Friday and really struggled in the first half in particular. His slightly better second half makes me think he can do a job for us tonight.
I think we’ll see a fairly settled backline tonight but then a more experimental lineup in the league cup next Tuesday, with the likes of Boyle, Nakayama, Jackson and Spencer all likely to get some minutes.
Midfield: Hogg, Holmes, Anjorin
Last season Carlos dropped Hogg into central defence because he didn’t think that he could play Hoggy and Russell in central midfield together. Last Friday Danny Schofield tried that pairing and it became really obvious that Carlos was completely right and the two together are too slow when played alongside each other, so one has to go if Schofield is going to stick with the 4-2-3-1 shape he played last week.
I think it makes more sense to drop Russell, pull Holmes back into central midfield so he can have more influence on the game and add a bit of dynamism into that area of the field and maybe a bit of creativity too.
That then creates the space further forward for Anjorin to start the game too. He made a huge impact when he came on against Burnley and would hopefully be able to do similar against Birmingham. Rather than playing as a traditional number 10, he may be better suited as a free roaming kind of position, where he can hunt around the pitch and create overloads wherever he can cause most damage. I believe he’s able to play anywhere across the front line, so he could be a very dangerous weapon in this kind of role.
Forwards: Thomas, Ward, Rudoni
Sorba Thomas looked out of sorts last week, like he was trying a bit too hard. That might have been because we had so little of the ball and he was trying to force things in the few opportunities we had to attack. This should be a game where he has more chance to get on the ball and express himself.
Danny Ward had no service to speak of last week so it’s hard to really say much about him. There were so many games last season where I said that same thing, so hopefully this won’t be another of those games. We have the players to give him good service and he’s capable to converting chances. So hopefully we’ll give him something to feed off.
Josh Koroma really struggled last weekend, so it seems logical to drop him and give Jack Rudoni a go after his impressive run out from the bench. It would also give us the flexibility to swap his position with Anjorin, Thomas and Holmes, so Schofield would be able to make a lot of attacking adjustments on the fly with this attacking lineup.
I think it would be better to put Lees at the right side of the defence where he is more settled and bring in Boyle on the left. Both Turton and Ruffels will have to improve a lot as they were both poor against Burnley. Hogg also isn’t playing well and but he will probably play as there is no-one else to do his kind of work. Holmes blows hot and cold and he could be on the bench with Russell keeping his place and Anjorin starting. The front 3 will be as in the article. Danny Schofield didn’t start well and Town must perform this time to give him some credibility. Perhaps the new assistant coach will liven things up.
The team that scofield chose against Burnley was to me uninspiring and I thought that before we kicked a ball and though out the game I was proved correct making Burnley looked a classy team which they are not . Against Birmingham radical thinking would not be a miss I would go for a 3-1-4- 2 the personnel chosen I have my chosen players subject circumstances.
I think if we have no one to replace Hogg,then we have massive problems.He doesn’t make tackles or win heading duels,he was decidedly out of puff I noticed.The defence was all over the place last week,the movement of Burnley was superb at times.
Anyone can be superb when they have a wide open midfield with no opposition.
Why wasn’t young jones not selected in the last game not even on the bench , to say he’s too young is ridiculous Alex Ferguson won the premiership with a very young team. I was never a big fan of Sarr but he did have many decent games and scored a few goals maybe we should have given him a new contract because apart from Lees Who do play in the back four . I’m far from hopeful that we will even get a draw against Bristol Sorry for being so pessimistic but even in this early part of the season not looking good
I think it was wages. Sarr would have quite rightly expected a pay rise if we gave him a new deal and Boyle was a cheaper option. In time it might look like food business but now it looks like penny pinching. I’m fairness, Sarr could be shocking at times, it’s only now he’s gone that we remember him so fondly.
Also, Jones should have been on the bench but was ill. Just bad luck rather than bad management.