Match Day Thread Huddersfield Town @ The John Smith's Stadium 26/12/2015

Back over the border to Huddersfield this time, our record in Yorkshire this season is not good three defeats and a draw, so a good opportunity to actually get a win in the land of the White Rose.
Town recently appointed David Wagner as manager following the dismissal of Chris Powell, SWagner could have taken a role at Anfield under his mentor Jurgen Klopp but has made a brave attempt to forge his own career as manager/headcoach. He is trying to bring in the geggen presse football that Klopp brought in a at Dortmund however so far Town have had a mixed bag of results , last time out the lost at Brentford but beat Rotherham in their last home game.
They have a useful striker in Nahki Wells plus journeyman Ishmael Miller who has never quite fulfilled his potential. In their ranks they have Harry Bunn who played one match for North End on loan, however he fell out with medal winner Westley and never played again for us which was a pity as he scored in his only game.
North End have Pickford available after his sending off was overturned yesterday. Personal view would like to see Welsh and Kilkenny start they give us a bit of solidity in the middle of the p[ark. Johnson misswed out on Sunday saw him limping round Elland Road so chances of him playing could be slim. No other injuries known apart from the long termers.
The game marks the half way point of the season, half way to the 50 point mark so so far so good.
Last visit to Town saw Jordan Rhodes score a hat trick.
At the moment 1800 tickets sold, many of those will still be comatose following the Christmas celebration which should ensure a boisterous atmosphere.
Never seen us win at the ground however enjoyed REM, the Eagles and Bryan Adams when they used to hold concerts.

 

From the swamp and wet lands of the West they came on the Boxing Day pilgrimage to take on those from the heathen lands of the White Rose. Through floods, downpours of biblical proportions they came to worship those in yellow. When arriving at the ground there was a strange thing in the sky it was the sun, verily an omen of good things to come for the visiting faithful.
It began with North End looking dangerous and Keane went close to scoring with North Ends first attack, however in Town's first attack Scannell had time to control the ball and shoot however he dallied too long and was closed out by the visitors defence.
North End looked good going forward but worrying the defence looked mighty shaky and was not getting a lot of protection from our non tackling midfield. Garner and Keane failed with decent chance, Keane brought the first save of any note by the keeper with Steer tipping the ball over.
Town took the lead seven minutes before the break, Clarke was easily turned in the box by a Town forward, the cross found Wells 10 yards out, he does not miss from those distances and today he didn't miss, probably slightly against the run of play but with the way our back line was playing probably not a surprise.
Town had a goal disallowed in the early minutes of the second half as their simple tactic was to play behind the ponderous North End backline and let the wind do the rest with Town's to speedy forwards ready to take advantage of it, it worked like a dream as Town ran riot in the early stages. North End were all over the shop and Town duly made it two when ball over the top Wells latched onto and made it two. North End crumbled and were in danger of getting a hammering only decent keeping and poor finishing kept the score down.
On the occasional foray forward North End seemed reluctant to shoot which led to the faithful to show their displeasure.
With the news that the ancient pathway of the M62 being shut for the journey of the faithful home to the swamplands, this was greeted by the the yellow hordes singing, "We are not going home" With 14 minutes many were, as befitting the time of the year it was pantomime time as Town scored a third direct from a corner Huwys, kick beating everyone including the majestic Pickford into the net. (He had a rare off day today)
Town should have scored more in the closing minutes but wasted several excellent chances as North End's defence disappeared on the breeze.
In the last minute came a Christmas miracle, Gallagher won North End's first tackle all afternoon, he kept the ball and his cross was superb and Reach cooly held off the defender and rounded the keeper and scored.
Nothing but a consolation, now for the journey home having decided to go the A62 Oldham route but got lost ended up going through the narrow streets only to end up at the main M62 junction.
Blown all over the place arrived at the sink hole area and nearly did five miles in an hour as soon as back in the Red Rose county down came the rain again.
Three hours and twenty minutes to get back to the swamp land.
Many of the faithful ask the Lord, why did we lose, he replied you were crap.

Huddersfield Town 3 Preston North End 1 Att

Video of Town's disallowed goal

Huddersfield head coach David Wagner: "The result was good, but not the performance in the first half. I'm not sure what the reason was.

"The conditions were difficult, especially with the wind against you, as it was for us in the first half.

"The result was good and we scored good goals. The table doesn't matter as much as the performances and the results and we need to be more consistent."

Preston manager Simon Grayson: "None of my players did what I wanted them to do.

"It was disappointing. We made three good chances and if we had scored in the first 12 seconds the result would have been different.

"We were too loose in possession and if you do that in the Championship you get punished. It's a lesson for us to learn."

 

Blah!