Toothless – Notes on Huddersfield Town’s defeat to Blackpool

Huddersfield Town lost their first game of the season against Blackpool on Saturday afternoon. It was a game of three distinct parts, with Town dominating the opening stages, then losing their heads for a spell where they conceded three goals, and after pulling a goal back and a Blackpool red card, the game settled into a dismal attack and defence training exercise where Town repeatedly failed to find a way through Blackpool’s defence. 

While Town’s toothless attacking play was a concern, the three quick goals they conceded is just as worrying. After talking so much about how things feel different at Town, this game was eerily similar to the type of football we saw last season.

A blistering opening 

The first few minutes of this game were brilliant to watch from a Town perspective. Blackpool couldn’t get near us and the slick passing and movement in our build up play was opening up opportunities for us. Blackpool couldn’t keep the ball when they got it because we were pressing them well and it felt like fair when Ben Wiles scored, even if their keeper should probably have stopped it. 

What came later casts a shadow over this opening spell but it’s worth pointing out that the version of Town that started this game was as good as the best bits of any of the three previous games. So these players have a gameplan that can be very effective, even against the better teams in this division. 

I suppose a key bit of information that helps to understand why Town were better at this stage than later, is that Blackpool had 11 players on the pitch and were trying to get into the game themselves. Thinking about it, Leyton Orient, Reading and Leicester all wanted to play football and get forward against us, so despite having varied styles, all of those first three victories came against teams that gave us space to play and we have done well in that situation. 

13 minutes that cost Town the game 

Huddersfield Town went from completely dominating the game to conceding three goals in 13 minutes, turning the score from 1-0 up to 3-1 down. The sad thing is that Town’s complete reversal of fortune was not triggered by brilliance from Blackpool but a single blunder that triggered a chain reaction of panic and mistakes that suggested some players’ heads went for a brief period of time. 

The biggest error came from Jack Whatmough, who completely misjudged a spinning ball and ran straight under it. The ball probably bounced a bit higher than normal but not to the extent that Whatmough missed it by. Ennis latched onto the loose ball and charged at goal and for reasons that aren’t clear, Joe Low didn’t come across to close down Ennis until way too late, despite Low having no obvious threat that we had covering in the central area. This allowed Ennis through on Goodman, who probably should have done better with the scruffy shot that went across his body but it looked like he was flummoxed by the ball bouncing in front of him. 

Blackpool’s second goal was a lovely strike from Evans but it came directly from a throw-in, so we should have been set up better to defend this situation. Having just conceded, the defenders looked to be flying out to try and win the ball back but too many got out of position and allowed this opening to occur. I’ve already mentioned the strike was sweetly struck but Goodman was beaten on his near post, which is never good to see. 

The third goal is another ugly one to watch from a Town perspective. Ennis does well to latch onto the ball across the box and guide it home but he was completely untracked. He did look offside (though annoyingly, I’ve not seen a conclusive camera angle on the highlights video) but that still doesn’t excuse the lack of awareness of one of their most dangerous players. And, to complete my triple gripe about Goodman, I think it was a bit too easy to slide the ball around him as he rushed out. If he’d have thrown himself at Ennis’s feet, he might have got in the way or if he’d set himself to save the shot sooner, he may have got something in the way but he just seemed a bit late to react to the danger. Though these kind of criticisms are easy to make when you’re sat watching the slow motion replays.  

Town then hit back themselves, after some lively play down the left from Roosken set him up to cross it low to Alfie May, who scuffed his shot perfectly into the run of Lynden Gooch, who then blasted it past their keeper. Another goal with a keeper getting beaten on their near post, the pace of the shot meaning their keeper couldn’t stop it despite it being millimeters from his glove. It seemed we’d ridden out the horrendous 13 minutes spell and were back in the game. Until…

The red card advantage

Ennis received a red card for his high tackle on Whatmough. The game was physical but there had been no nastiness until this point and I’d guess it was just a very misjudged tackle rather than anything deliberately dangerous. The ref was probably right to send him off, as Ennis went in far too high and could have caused a serious injury. 

I think the red card was the best thing that happened to Blackpool all afternoon, as this gave Steve Bruce a reason to abandon the match as a serious contest and instead they approached it like a training scenario where they would do nothing but defend and clear the ball long whenever they got it back. At 11v11, with them having lost their previous three games, they couldn’t have such a negative strategy but with ten men they put everything behind the ball and engaged in the dark art of time wasting at every opportunity. 

It pains me to say it, but I think Steve Bruce got his tactics spot on here and while it ruined the game as a spectacle, they stuck to their gameplan diligently and didn’t give us a single opening to exploit from that point onwards. Their players also deserve commending for defending tirelessly and consistently for the remaining time in the game. 

Though, alongside plaudits to Blackpool, there needs to be some blame handed out to Town’s players too. From getting the red card until Castledine’s strike that went wide in the dying moments, we didn’t create any meaningful chances. Playing against ten men is hard but there are ways to do it. The obvious one is to chuck a big man up front and lump the ball up to them. It’s not beautiful football but can be used to make a breakthrough against a team that’s tough to break down. Alternatively, you can pass the team to death, pulling them from one side of the pitch to the other until a gap inevitably opens up. I think this was our plan but we didn’t string enough consecutive passes together or move the ball quickly enough to ever create those gaps. Another option would be to work the ball into situations where we can take shots from range, but we didn’t look to be attempting this despite having players capable of scoring from range.

Obviously, Town are lacking a big target man striker for these situations but Joe Low and Jack Whatmough were both not doing much at the back, so one could have been spared to go up and give us a different way of playing. 

Call it parking the bus or “the low block” but this definitely won’t be the last time Town have to break down a team that is determined to shut up shop and sit tight. The group, as Grant likes to refer to his players, collectively failed with the challenge of breaking down Blackpool. Even worse, they failed by a really wide margin and looked very flat and lacking in creativity during the 11 v 10 period of the game. 

We won’t play against ten men every week but we will quite frequently have to break down a resolute defence. If we want to succeed this season, we’re going to need to think of better ways to approach this scenario. There’s potential to do that, either through bringing in new players or working up some new ideas on the training pitch. I’ll believe in Town’s potential to succeed this season a lot more when we prove we can break down stubborn opponents. 

Too many fouls 

I mentioned earlier that Blackpool engaged in the dark arts to close out this game, where every contact from a Town player resulted in an elaborate fall to the floor which the referee gladly blew for. I don’t have any issue with the Blackpools players for doing this but I think the referee could have been a bit sharper rather than falling for it every time. 

The key thing was that Town showed a bit of naivety by making contact with Blackpool players so often and giving them the chance to hurl themselves at the floor. Our players were frustrated and wanted to get the ball back as quickly as possible but the over enthusiasm resulted in all the pressure on Blackpool being relieved every time they won a foul and we had to build up from the back again. 

The high intensity pressing has been one of my favourite features of Town’s approach this season but in this situation we were either being over-exuberant or just not technically good enough to take the ball without making contact with their players. 

Was this Lee Grant’s fault?

I’d not say that Lee Grant was to blame for Town losing but I don’t think he reacted all that well to the circumstances and Steve Bruce schooled him with the way he orchestrated his team in shutting the game down. 

Lee Grant’s substitutions have tended to be very good up until now, notably seeing four subs combine for the final goal against Leyton Orient on the opening day. But in this game the changes didn’t do anything to change the dynamic, mostly being like-for-like or even, when we brought a striker (Taylor) on for a midfielder (Wiles), it just resulted in May dropping deeper and the shape being more or less the same. 

We’ve seen some recent Town managers chop and change formations every game, or in the case of Carlos Corberan and Danny Cowley, multiple times in the same game. Whereas other managers have had their system and stuck to it, Wagner would fit in this category. So far, it looks like Lee Grant is more in the latter camp, as he’s taught his players one system and is mostly sticking to that shape regardless of the opposition, available Town players and circumstances in a game. 

When Blackpool more or less gave up on having the ball at all for long spells of this game, it feels like a mistake that we were broadly in the same shape that we started the game in. There’s probably an argument for sticking with the system that the players train with and are drilled on but it felt a bit too much to dogmatically stick to a plan that wasn’t working. 

So far, Lee Grant has come across as a thoughtful and intelligent manager. It’ll be interesting to see if he’s learned from this experience and if he’ll have another way to approach this scenario the next time it occurs.  

This is still a good start for Town 

With two wins out of three in the league and an impressive cup victory against the team favourite to win the Championship, this is still a good start for Town. If Town continue to win two then lose one for the rest of the season then we’ll finish with more than 90 points and will most likely be in the automatic promotion mix..

AndrewB left a comment this morning on my Blackpool player ratings article and suggested the bubble of hope has been pricked. While I enjoy the poeticism of his comment, my personal bubble of hope has merely been deflated a little bit by this set back. While there’s no doubt that it was a bad result and a poor performance, this result may prove to be useful in the long run. 

While things have been going well, there have been wobbly moments in all of Town’s games so far this season. This match has highlighted the risks of taking too many gambles at the back and the danger League One teams can present if we aren’t on top of our game. It’s also shown that Town need some creative ways to break down teams that sit deep. 

The first three games and the opening ten minutes of this game, have shown that this team has a lot of potential but this game against Blackpool has also raised some questions that the team will need to find answers fore before they can be a real force to be reckoned with. 

My main hope is that this defeat is just a single bad day at the office but we saw in that 13 minutes of madness how one set back can quickly lead to more. Against Doncaster on Tuesday night, it is really important that Town show a good response and don’t spiral downwards from here.