Huddersfield Town digest: Nagle on summer transfer plans and stadium negotiations
Huddersfield Town digest: Nagle on summer transfer plans and stadium negotiations
Plus important academy news, key revelations from The Athletic’s piece on Town and a special Football Fives crossover episode
What’s been said
“Get back in the Championship league. There’s just no question about it. That’s our goal. Michael [Duff] knows it, Jake [Edwards] knows it, Mark [Cartwright] knows it. Really the entire staff; they know it.
“It won’t be easy, but we’re going to drive for it. There’s a pretty grand plan. This is the year we’re going to come back. I feel very good about Michael Duff. I feel very good about Jake. I feel very good about Mark. Judge us this year.”
— Kevin Nagle, during his X video diary, when asked about the club’s aim for the 2024/25 season
“[We’re] going to have Michael Duff and his team and a team we all build. It’s going to be very different. But we do know that when we do character checks, that’s really at the top right along with the quality of the play …
“Michael has been extremely successful in League One, he knows the players, quality and team he wants — and chemistry on that team. I feel very good about where we are.
“I know there’s been some questions about why we aren’t signing free transfers. But as much as we can all these players being looked at, we have got a very defined plan in how we are going to move forward.”
— Kevin Nagle, during his X video diary, explaining the club’s approach to transfers over the summer window
“We are in really heavy negotiations.
“It's sort of funny. Right before this, I was working with Michael Thomas, who is my CFO, on a counter-proposal to Mr [Ken] Davy, who actually owns Huddersfield Giants [and] who was previously the chairman of Huddersfield Town AFC as well.
“He will be receiving the latest proposal from me. I feel we are really close. I think there's three or four points and I hope to have a deal.
“Ken has been really great to deal with so far and I feel we're going to get over the finish line in maybe the next week or two. I feel that. I hope I am not jinxing myself. But the reality of this is that negotiations are going fluid.
“We will try and move and make the stadium — the John Smith's Stadium or whatever it may be called in the future, because we will want to make a change on it — one of the centres, if not the centre of Huddersfield, where we plan to have a lot of changes that go on there.
“I am excited by that. We've got a lot of them that are actually designed right now and we're trying to figure out in what order because you are up against the clock. You know the Giants are playing there right now and will play in the next six weeks or two months. We've got to make sure we are ready.”
— Kevin Nagle, during his X video diary, answering a question about the club’s plans to gain operational control of the John Smith’s Stadium
The fascinating past, present, and future of the John Smith’s Stadium
In case you missed it, we released a special edition of the podcast for subscribers last week, reflecting on the club’s move from Leeds Road to the John Smith’s Stadium some 30 years ago.
The pod features contributions from former Huddersfield Town board members Alan Sykes, Graham Leslie, and George Binns, club icon Andy Booth, and architecture expert Tomasz Romaniewicz, plus archive thoughts from Neil Warnock and Kevin Nagle.
We examine the ways in which the new stadium achieved its objectives for Town and for Huddersfield, and where it has fallen short — and, of course, we ponder the pressing question of what comes next for the ground and its surrounding areas.
Plus, look at that beautiful artwork from Peter O’Toole. Wouldn’t it look perfect on a T-shirt? Of course it would. Visit the store now!
“We are delighted to confirm that our Huddersfield Town Academy has been officially granted Category Three status for the 2024/25 season!
Having announced intentions to re-open our full Academy at the start of the 2023/24 season, a number of evaluations, audits and inspections have been required in order for the Club to receive permission to continue with that work.
Successful in all areas and criteria, the new-look Huddersfield Town Academy will operate with Category Three status from the 2024/25 campaign, with a full intake of young footballers to follow from the ages of eight upward.
Tasked with the long-term goal of creating homegrown Town players, the project will be overseen by Academy Manager Jon Worthington, who was himself an Academy graduate.
Huddersfield Town CEO Jake Edwards said:
‘Investing in our youth and future is of great strategic importance to what we’re trying to achieve as a Club long-term, with Chairman Kevin Nagle a huge believer in that philosophy.
‘We are proud of how our existing Academy staff have embraced this challenge and passed the necessary tests with flying colours, and this gives us a platform from which to build going forward.
‘Supporters will now begin to see changes, with new infrastructure planned to support our staff and players to give them the best possible chance of succeeding in the future.”
Huddersfield Town Academy Manager Jon Worthington commented:
‘This is a really exciting step for the Academy and a lot of hard work has gone into having our Category Three status confirmed, so our staff deserve a huge amount of credit for that.
‘Our job is now to create an environment in which young footballers can learn, develop and grow, building themselves into Huddersfield Town First Team players of the future, whilst learning and adopting the beliefs and principles of our Club.
‘A product of our youth system, I know first hand just how important these early years can be both personally and professionally, and we will be doing everything in our power to ensure our Academy is built to compete and enrich.”
‘Supporters will now begin to see changes, with new infrastructure planned to support our staff and players to give them the best possible chance of succeeding in the future.’”
— Huddersfield Town, in a statement on the club website, announcing that Huddersfield Town Academy has officially been granted category three status for the 2024/25 season
“‘The relationship between [Andre Breitenreiter] and the dressing room was not the best,’ says one source around the first-team squad. ‘Some of the things he said came as a surprise to people. There were people saying: This is absurd, I am not like this. They would be angry. He was like that with a lot of players.
‘He had a few run-ins with players around the training ground. It would be about things going on during training, if he heard anyone moaning or arguing.
‘It was a difficult environment to play in. People had to get their heads around why a manager was being like this. It was obviously his way of trying to get the best out of people — tough love — but many didn’t agree with that way.
‘Everyone had the fear of relegation on their minds. It was tough for some players because they knew their salary would be halved for dropping in League One. It was so important to them for Huddersfield to stay in the division from a living standpoint as well as for professional pride.’”
— Greg O’Keefe, writing in The Athletic, quoting a source on Andre Breiteinreiter’s management style
Football Fives presents: The ultimate Huddersfield Town five-a-side team
Your usual We Are Terriers podcast hosts Steven Chicken and David Hartrick are delighted to be joined for this week’s podcast by i’s chief football writer Daniel Storey, High Protein Beef Paste’s Chris Nee, and (sort of, for a bit) Dice Football’s Ryan Keaney — aka the old Football Fives crew — to pick our Huddersfield Town five-a-side team.
For those unfamiliar, Football Fives was a popular long-running podcast hosted by the five of us that often followed this format. We go position-by-position through a five-a-side team to pick a goalkeeper and four outfielders, with one nomination getting the thumbs up from the host to go into the final team.
We had a blast recording this and we think you’ll have a great time listening to it…even if you profoundly a couple of nominations who frankly were picked just because one of us wanted to talk about them rather than on actual merit…
Our schedule
…remains a bit flexible depending on any news coming out of the club. You’ll no doubt have noticed digests like these are not a regular feature throughout the summer months, but we will put them together for all readers when we think we have enough to make them worthwhile.
We will, however, continue to have a podcast out for paid backers every week and we’re particularly proud of that John Smith’s Stadium episode, if you’ve not checked it out already. Dave and I will be back with a regular old episode come what may next week.
We will also keep putting out at least two written pieces exclusively for our backers each week. Throughout the off-season, these will be a mix of preview articles looking ahead to the new campaign and more timeless stuff covering important topics that we don’t always have time to consider during the season.