Huddersfield Town host Watford this afternoon in their final game of an intense period of double-game weeks. The squad will have the luxury of a full week before they next return to action against Barnsley on Boxing Day.
The need to rotate players should be reduced because we’ve not got a midweek game to consider so I’d expect to see close to our best available starting eleven.
Goalkeeper: Schofield
Hamer’s injury niggle is clearly worse than it originally sounded as he’s going to miss today’s game too. I can’t say I’m bothered as it’s nice to see Schofield getting more first team experience.
I was surprised by some of Carlos’ comments in the pre-match press conference about his goalkeepers playing out from the back. He said he would prefer Schofield to play long more often but it is the keeper’s choice to play risky short passes. This is the exact opposite of how it looks from the outside and I’ve got the impression that any keeper that boots it up field too often is likely to be dropped. Whoever is making the decisions, I thought that we were a bit more sensible with the choice of whether to go long or short against Coventry, so I’m not too concerned.
Defence: Pipa, Edmonds-Green, Sarr, Brown
Watford have a resolute defence, so we need Pipa to provide some creative spark today as well as doing his defensive duties. He had a few decent runs from deep against Coventry and I’d like to see more today.
Edmonds-Green continues to play with a serene confidence which makes him look like he’s gliding around the pitch. He stands out when he’s on the ball and picking out passes but we’ve not seen a lot of him doing the ugly side of his job. If Troy Deeney plays today he’s likely to pull onto Edmonds-Green and see if he’s up for a physical battle today. I’m curious to see if he stands up to that kind of attention from an experienced and powerful forward.
Someone on the And He Takes That Chance podcast compared Naby Sarr to Efe Sodje this week, which I think was harsh but there is the shared tendency to swing wildly between moments of brilliance and incompetence within any game. Sarr’s a better player than Sodje and would most likely be playing at the highest level if he wasn’t prone to the odd clanger. It’s important for Sarr to have a run of games now without any major mishap to shake off this reputation.
Even though we’re not playing in midweek, I would still give Toffolo a rest for this game. He’s been off his best for a few games now and I think we’ve asked too much of him to play the way he plays, twice a week for this long. Brown is a capable understudy and while he isn’t as good as Toffolo’s usual standard, I think he is better than the recent levels Toffolo has produced.
Midfield: Hogg, O’Brien, Eiting, Pritchard
One of the few good things to come out of the Coventry game was Hogg returning from injury unscathed and looking back to his best. He’ll want to put in a good showing against his old club today, where he’s got cult hero status after providing an assist in a playoff final.
O’Brien and Eiting are in similar positions for me. They’re clearly the best options for the midfield duo but both haven’t been playing to their potential lately. Whether the issue is tactical, physical or psychological is a mystery but something isn’t clicking for them in central midfield and therefore they’re not quite right. With O’Brien he is consistently misplacing simple passes and Eiting is struggling to get into the game at all at times. The good news is that even off form they still make a decent unit but there potential for a lot more from this pair.
Whether Pritchard is played as a number ten, false nine or a makeshift winger, I think he’ll be given a chance today purely because Bacuna continues to frustrate and surely can’t keep on playing poorly and getting into the starting lineup. I thought Pritchard did just about enough from the bench on Wednesday to justify a starting slot today but he’s got a lot to do to win over the fans after years of under achievement. In defence of Town fans though, look at how we’ve all celebrated Mbenza’s resurgence this season. We will get behind players when they perform even if they’ve struggled in the past.
Forwards: Campbell and Mbenza
Diakhaby must realise he’s blown his chance with yet another manager when he’s one of only two fit wingers in the squad and the manager would rather play kids or change the tactical system than play him. I’m a bit disappointed with him because he didn’t really deserve the opportunity he was provided this season after failing under four previous managers (Wagner, Siewert, Cowley and whoever was in charge at Forest during his loan). Yet, after showing some glimmers of potential he’s now back to looking like the poster boy for our Premier League transfer mistakes.
Mbenza, on the other hand, has grasped his chance this season and shown that he’s capable of being a real threat at this level. I also think it’s significant that he looks happier playing football these days too and seems to be a popular member of the squad. While he will regret not finishing the game’s best chance on Wednesday night (or squaring to Bacuna) he still looked out most potent attacking force and we need him to keep that up while Koroma is injured.
I was quite scathing of Campbell’s performance against Coventry but we haven’t got any other viable options with Ward and Philips both injured. Kian Harratt might make the bench after being recalled from his loan at Guiseley but he failed to score in five appearances for them so it would be a bit odd to then throw him into our starting eleven.
I’m desperately trying to think of anything vaguely controversial about your starting XI but there’s really nothing to say. It just serves to show what we already knew that at the moment there’s no pressure on any position with the possible exception of the keeper.
yes simon due to the injuries we have not a lot of ptions as for toffolo I see where you are coming from but on this occasion I would stick with toff but to be honest all the squad will be happy the three games a week will peter out.
I see logic in Brown for Toffolo, but I would find it hard to drop him despite being less than effective as a wing back in recent games. But Pritchard??? To be fair he looked ok in his cameo against Coventry but selcting him is scraping the bottom of the barrell – at least Bacuna is capable of flashes of briliance and you can’t really say that about Pritch. I was talking to a Norwich fan the other day and mntioned Pritchard and they said they didn’t ever recall him being a standout player so I looked at his stats. He scored one goal in a 5-0 victory, two goals in a 5-1 victory, two goals in a 7-1 victory and one goal in a 4 0 victory. The otehr goal game in a 2-2 draw – this tells me he is ok when the team is playing well but he is not a grafter, but I guess you can make stats look like anything you want.
Not sure how big a part Carlos’ trousers played in that result, but well played Town for battling away. For sure,Watford came bearing gifts but if ever the whole was greater than the sum of the parts then that was it. Schofield at one end and Campbell at the other were both superb but everyone contributed in between. There is nothing more that needs to be said. Well played. UTT.
good allround team effort with everyone working hard and cambell was outstanding. well done town!
There’s some very upbeat comments. I’m putting it down to the early euphoria of getting 3 points against the odds. When you guys come back down to earth, you might reflect and realise that it wasn’t an all-round outstanding display.
I’m pleased for Schofield and I’m also pleased for Campbell, the latter in particular has been much criticised by me over the weeks & months. Both players were certainly outstanding today.
Was Eiting on the pitch? Bacuna – better than midweek but can’t say much more than that. Everybody else I felt contributed to a win which, let’s be honest, only came about due to Watford’ giving us 2 early Christmas presents.
I think you said exactly the same as me, just dressed up in different dialogue. Or as I like to say “same potato, different gravy”.
You’re probably right, Ian. I think it was the sentence “there’s nothing more that need be said” that got me. Followed by David’s ‘everything in the garden is rosy’ message, I thought as a Yorkshireman I was duty bound to dampen the spirits.
it wasnt a outstanding performance but for work rate closing down it was a good team effort of that there shoulkd be nondoubt and a deserved win
Despite all the different messages on here, todays papers still say Town 2-0 Watford, they made the mistakes we normaly make, tough, it cost them the game, we gave them a lesson in how to defend a first half lead, and had a local lad who gave a superb performance in Campbell, we would have all taken 28 pts. by christmas,
might even be 31 by new year, a house is built brick by brick and Carlos is putting a shift in, let him get on with it
and let our glasses for christmas and new year be half full not half empty, I would like to wish every Town supporter a very happy Christmas and a 31 pts. New Year. UTT.
good post and the same to you and all town fans
Dont forget we had a local lad between the sticks at the other end. He does look at bit gangly and awkward at times but hats off to him for another clean sheet.