Today is the penultimate game of Huddersfield Town’s season and hopefully the day we can cast aside our relegation fears and hope for a better season next time around. If Town beat Coventry today then we’ve cleared the admittedly low bar of avoiding the drop or, more likely, we may fail to win and still survive because Derby and/or Rotherham fail to win their games.
Here’s a preview of today’s game.
Predicted Huddersfield Town XI to take on Coventry
Goalkeeper: Schofield
Defence: Pipa, Edmonds-Green, Sarr, Toffolo
Midfield: Hogg, O’Brien, Eiting
Attack: Rowe, Ward, Koroma
It’s hard to predict how different today’s lineup will be. Carlos was emphatic in his press conference that he won’t treat this game as an opportunity to experiment with his lineup as we still need points to be safe but what is the best eleven after last week’s starting team were completely outplayed by Blackburn?
The fitness of the recently returned players sounds questionable, with several not able to train consistently this week. So Toffolo, Pipa, Eiting and Koroma are all doubtful but I’ve included them becuase I get the feeling Carlos is willing to chuck them in regardless of their injuries.
I think that Keogh and Bacuna should be dropped after last weekends debacle. If we had better backup then almost the entire eleven from that game would struggle to jusifty their continued selection, barring Koroma, who saved our blushes somewhat with two bits of individual excellence.
Predicted score – a nil nil, bore draw
Coventry are hardly world beaters but over the course of the 44 games we’ve had this season they have proven themselves to be better than Town. They are safe though and hopefully might not be at their best (though that didn’t play out against Blackburn last weekend).
As for Town, I can’t see us being nearly as open or gullible in this game, so I expect a tight game with few chances. While we have our more creative players back available, I can’t see them getting forwards often enough to carve open Coventry, who are well organised at the back.
Four key talking points for today’s game
Can Town raise their game to finish on a positive note?
The terrible run of form Town are on must be kryptonite for season ticket sales. The board will be praying that we can put in something like a decent performance or two before the season ends to offer a glimmer of hope to fans that are on the fence. There’s been very little to incentivise fans in recent displays.
You’d think professional pride would kick in with the players and they would lift their game a little bit. Though the players will also need to be given a better game plan to execute too, as many of our problems last weekend came from poor tactics as much as individual players getting things wrong.
Are our best players fit enough?
I don’t mean fit enough to start, as I think we’ll see most of the returning players regardless of their fitness. I mean fit enough to make make a difference to the game. With another week’s recovery under their belt it may be we see more out of Eiting, Toffolo and Pipa or it could be that they’re just being patched up and thrown back into action.
I feel like this season we’ve suffered the consequences of a high-intensity training regime with all the injuries we’ve had but haven’t particularly reaped the rewards. We don’t seem all that much fitter than our opponents and don’t have that relentlessness that Bielsa’s Leeds teams have, which was surely the end goal of Carlos’ approach.
How safe is Carlos?
It was the morning after Town’s penultimate game of the season that the Cowleys were “relieved” of their duties. Could the same happen to Carlos once safety is confirmed? It would be understandable, looking at the results since Christmas but Phil’s recent endorsement of Corberán in his monthly updates suggests he’ll be safe.
I think there needs to be a decision made either way. Either he’s the man and we fully back him and bring in players that suit his style or we decide the experiment has failed and bring in a new manager before this summer’s squad rebuilding job. Letting Carlos limp into next season on a final warning and without fully backing his vision in the transfer market would be a poor choice as we’ll just end up sacking him at the first sign of a bad run.
Will there be more fans in the trees?
On Town’s last home game, the 1-0 defeat to Barnsley, a Town fan climbed up a tree on the Kilner Bank and watched the game while precariously perched on a thin branch. The Examiner ran an article that described him as a genius which I think is maybe a stretch. While I admit it was funny, it also probably wasn’t a great idea and too many fans replicating this stunt today could lead to problems.
There have been tongue-in-cheek calls on social media for more fans to watch today’s game from the Kilner Bank tree tops. I worry that if too many fans take this seriously it could lead to problems with the Police. Maybe I’m just being a killjoy but it would be a shame to spoil things when football fans have typically been pretty good at staying away while restrictions have been in place.
You’re probably right about most things (as usual!), but i hope you’re wrong about the 0-0. My brain agrees with you, but the players ought to have more than professional pride to play for – even those who aren’t up to fight for the badge should feel the need to fight for themselves: regardless if they want new contracts at Town or elsewhere, they need to show off a decent performance to advertise their competence.
I also agreed with your thoughts on Corberan: all the way until last weekend I would’ve been all for backing him over the summer and been an optimist for next year, but Blackburn felt like the second-to-final straw. I’d still like to see Town give him one more chance, but would no longer be shocked if he leaves tomorrow.
Most likely this will be the 3rd of 4 last year we secure survival on the penultimate day of the season. That’s not exactly progress, is it?
I very much doubt Corberan will go, first off I don’t think we can afford to terminate his contract, second Phil doesn’t strike me as someone who will risk egg on his face after recently endorsing his man, and finally, regardless of which manager has been at the helm recently, we’ve looked crap. Apart from a glimmer at the start of this season. I think that glimmer is more than enough to keep Carlos ahead of any possible replacements. We do need to back him in the summer though, and I don’t mean by spending millions, because that doesn’t guarantee you quality (Pritchard, Diakhaby, Kongolo) I look at Koroma and Pipa who were relatively cheap and the likes of Rowe coming through the B team and it gives me faith we do know how to find and develop players. Not very encouraging I know to ask to continue down this road, but let’s hope things pick up after this car crash of a season.
Interesting comment on season ticket sales. Our league position says we are no worse than last season and let’s face it, Siewart was dire and the Cowley’s as dull as ditch water. The difference next season is that we may reasonably expect to be allowed into games in 2021/22, so that has got to be a boost. All the plastics will still stay away, but those who saved the pennies in a pandemic may come back out from under their stones.
Carlos was history as far as I was concerned back in February! Everything since then has just confirmed what I thought then – not a great tactician, not a great man-manager, no great eye for new signings, not a great anything except as a Number 2 somewhere other than Town.
I will be watching again today but I already feel like I’ve thrown a tenner to the wind. The end of this woeful, often embarrassingly bad season can’t come soon enough for me.
It would have been cheaper to buy a season ticket unless you just pick and choose when to support Town.
Some of us don’t have it within us to ‘pick & choose’ as you call it, Ian. It’s rather like having a child that constantly lets you down; you still love them despite everything.
You may have a point looking at today’s line up. Rowe at right back again, I know we’re short of full backs but he’s much better on the wing. Only starting one winger, which will mean Holmes is probably starting out of position again, I don’t understand why when we have so many wingers. Keogh at centre half once again against a counter attacking team, wouldn’t Edmonds Green be better there? Especially after last weekend. I’m not expecting much from today unfortunately. This insistence on playing players out of position is infuriating.
It’s half time and we are rubbish again. All down to Corberan. Out of position players. Tactics useless. Totally out of his depth. Whatever the cost, sack him.
Totally agree, John Holmes. It’s now full time; somehow I stuck it to the end. If the first half from Town was bad, the second was diabolical.
Corberan hasn’t got the first clue. Players playing out of position rarely, if ever, works. Surely Corberan has learnt that by now? Even the substitutes, albeit the right ones to bring on, were pretty dreadful. Pipa charges about to no great effect. Aarons was very poor down the right. Eiting’s passing was better than Bacuna’s but that’s not raising the bar very high.
Woe is me.
Woe is all of us. Who’d want to come either to play or coach (not manage as under the present regime, nobody will be allowed to do that). Even the fans will boycott the season tickets. How ever did we end up with such an embarrassingly inept owner.
Now we know, Championship football next season, its time to turn this club on its head, kick all the wasters out, give the coach license to bring in new blood, of which the first pair I would go for is Westwood and Bannan from SW and never mind Rhodes, he is yesterdays man, the other two are tried and tested Championship players, the coach should have till new year to prove his point, he could not do it with the bunch of wasters we have had, but he deserves a close season and new legs, and he should have the full backing of the owner and his sidekick with the importent sounding title, and lets see if they live up to it, all Town fans should raise a glass to Christopher Schindler and offer him all our best wishes, how many of us will live to see another £280m penalty,
so lets all get behind Carlos and his team, and bring HTFC back where they belong, at the top of the tree. UTT
David, you’re the man rearranging the deckchairs whilst the Titanic is sinking!
Even if Corboran’s playing style works, and I have my doubts, it requires a quality of player way beyond Town’s means. Tactically CC has already shown us that he is inept. I certainly don’t want to continue with this experiment a moment longer. I don’t blame anyone for having taken this calculated risk a year ago; but there comes a point when you just have to acknowledge that it hasn’t worked and very unlikely to work based on a full season’s experience.
So let’s not start by looking on deck at the deckchairs; let’s first look up at the bridge and change the man that has navigated us onto an iceberg.