Huddersfield Town digest: Nagle's team talk and Breitenreiter's message
Plus injury news and our predicted line-up for the trip to Preston, scorelines to watch out for this week, and a vital couple of games ahead for Town Women
What’s been said
“It was really good to see the whole stadium was behind the boys and believed in the last goal. One of my assistants said ‘OK, wait wait wait, 92 minutes we will score — it was 94! It was really good to see. The boys deserved it and it was really good to see so many happy faces.”
— Andre Breitenreiter, following Town’s 1-0 win over Millwall on Saturday afternoon
“One thing I wanted to say is the fans were great and gave us big support, but I don’t like it when they criticise players like Ben Jackson or Tom Edwards today. I will always fight for my players, I stand in front of them, and I don’t like this. It doesn’t help the players and the whole club — Town — when things like in the second half happen.
“They did it well, and also both players showed a performance to help us to win this game. It was a decision to let Ben play as a starter and Tom in the last few minutes because we know he’s the best player to play crosses, and we need crosses. When you have players like Danny Ward and Rhys Healey on the pitch, you need the best crosses, and this was the idea.
“We need to win all together, and where there is pressure on some players because of the supporters it doesn’t help because then maybe he is full of fear to play crosses, but we have to win, all together. This is what I want to say and we need respect for all the players.”
— Andre Breitenreiter, on the boos and jeers aimed at Ben Jackson and Tom Edwards by some Town fans during the Millwall game
“There’s no expectation [on Ollie Turton], he’s not ready for 30-45 minutes, but sometimes we have many players off injured and it’s important to have a professional player on the bench.
“He’s absolutely professional, he’s supporting the team when we need experience. When it's necessary to let him play for five minutes, it works.
“We need all the energy we can have, and he was so happy [on Friday] when we decided to go with him to the stadium. It's really good to see — but no questions please about when he starts, because I'm not sure he can start this season, but he can help us with his presence.”
— Andre Breitenreiter, on Ollie Turton’s return to the matchday squad at the weekend following a 14-month injury lay-off
"[Kevin Nagle] spoke to the team [the day before] the game, because I wanted that he speak to the team, and when we celebrated after the game I told Mark Cartwright 'come on, call Kevin, he should come into the dressing room and we should stay all together'.
"Jake Edwards, Mark Cartwright, the media boss and Kevin Nagle were all in the dressing room and we could see the big American mentality and emotions. It was really great and I had to congratulate him!
"It was just one game, but this moment, you have to think about and never forget that maybe it's a start for the last five games to have some good wins. It's better to have many faces smiling than always angry. It was really good to see."
— Andre Breitenreiter, on Kevin Nagle’s post-match team talk following the victory over Millwall
"You never share what you talk to the players about in the locker room and I promised Andre I wouldn't as well. That said, I was really proud of the way they responded to me."
— Kevin Nagle, on X, neither confirming nor denying Carmichael Dave’s intel on what the chairman had told the players
Coming up next
Preston North End will be keenly aware that if they fail to win at Deepdale on Tuesday evening, they can probably wave goodbye to their fading hopes of securing a play-off spot this season.
Ryan Lowe’s side made an excellent start to the current campaign, winning six and drawing two of their first eight league games, but were unable to maintain that through a difficult autumn.
Preston hit their stride again after the new year to stay in the running for the top six. But even with a game in hand, they cannot afford to let their seven-point gap to the play-off places grow after losing to Birmingham and drawing away to Watford in their past two outings.
Town summer sale Duane Holmes claimed two assists when Preston won 1-3 at the John Smith’s Stadium in December. He will need to be watched carefully again if he is restored to the side having been in and out of Lowe’s thoughts over the past few months.
Town will then visit Bristol City on Saturday afternoon. Liam Manning’s side have sat firmly in mid-table all season, never really putting a serious winning run together but never going without points for long either.
City currently seem to be enjoying the lack of pressure from having anything to play for, however, taking ten points from their past four games — including an impressive 1-0 victory over Leicester City.
The Robins will face potential survival rivals Blackburn Rovers at Ashton Gate on Wednesday evening.
Huddersfield Town injuries and absences
Breitenreiter expects to have the same squad for the trip to Preston as was available to him for the victory over Millwall on Saturday.
The head coach revealed ahead of the Millwall game that Jack Rudoni had been playing through a hamstring issue for a week or two but felt unable to continue to do so. The midfielder will continue to be assessed game to game but is unlikely to feature against Preston on Tuesday evening.
Radinio Balker and Tom Lees both remain out with thigh and calf issues respectively, raising the question as to whether the pair’s affected limbs could be surgically attached to one another to form some kind of grotesque shared super-defender leg. Failing that, neither will be available at Deepdale.
Jonathan Hogg has seen a specialist about the shoulder injury he picked up against Coventry City on Good Friday. Breitenreiter could not offer any further detail than that regarding the skipper’s prognosis.
Danny Ward returned to action from the bench on Saturday following the back injury that kept him out against Stoke. Breitenreiter confirmed Ward is likely to be named as a substitute again against Preston.
Breitenreiter added that Bojan Radulovic was struggling with a bit of a stamp he received during the Millwall game, but there was no suggestion from the head coach that it is likely to rule the centre-forward out of action.
Ollie Turton made a surprise return to the bench against Millwall after what had previously been described as a season-ending knee injury. The right-back’s inclusion as an unused substitute was the first time he has been named on a first-team teamsheet since suffering an ACL injury away to Stoke in February last year, followed by an MCL injury on his comeback for the B team this January.
Yuta Nakayama (knee) and Josh Ruffels (groin) are both ruled out for the season, while Kian Harratt is suspended for the rest of the campaign.
Predicted Huddersfield Town line-up to face Preston North End
4-4-2: Lee Nicholls; Brodie Spencer, Matty Pearson, Michal Helik, Jaheim Headley; Sorba Thomas, David Kasumu, Alex Matos, Josh Koroma; Delano Burgzorg, Rhys Healey.
Substitutes: Chris Maxwell, Tom Edwards, Ben Jackson, Ollie Turton, Tom Iorpenda, Ben Wiles, Pat Jones, Bojan Radulovic, Danny Ward.
Elsewhere in the survival fight
Scorelines to keep an eye on elsewhere this week:
Midweek
(7:45pm unless noted)
Tuesday: Sheffield Wednesday v Norwich City
Tuesday: Millwall v Leicester City
Tuesday: Plymouth Argyle v Queens Park Rangers
Wednesday: Bristol City v Blackburn Rovers
Wednesday: Birmingham City v Cardiff City
Wednesday (8pm): Swansea City v Stoke City
This weekend
(Saturday 3pm unless noted)
(Friday 8pm) Plymouth Argyle v Leicester City
(Saturday 12:30pm) Leeds United v Blackburn Rovers
Birmingham City v Coventry City
Hull City v Queens Park Rangers
Millwall v Cardiff City
Sheffield Wednesday v Stoke City
Swansea City v Rotherham United
Huddersfield Town Women
Rebecca Beresford pulled Town back level immediately after hosts Burnley opened the scoring midway through the first half on Sunday afternoon. Unfortunately, the Clarets went back ahead eight minutes later before rounding off a 3-1 win two minutes after the break.
Town have just four games still to play and a seven-point gap to make up with two games in hand on Stourbridge and a superior goal difference. That’s means they need to get at least a point at home to Nottingham Forest on Thursday evening to ensure there is no risk of losing their fight against the drop when they visit Newcastle United on Sunday afternoon.
With Stourbridge set to visit Town on the final day, though, it’s all still to play for. That Forest game will be played at the Stafflex Arena in a 7:45pm kick-off, so get down there to support them.
Our schedule
I will have player ratings from the Preston game available for all readers on Tuesday evening, followed by five conclusions for our paying backers on Wednesday morning.
It’ll be the same routine after the Bristol City game on Saturday: ratings on the whistle, conclusions to follow Saturday evening/Sunday morning.
Backers can expect this week’s We Are Terriers podcast sometime on Wednesday or Thursday. Our current thinking is that we’ll look to record on Wednesday evening if Town beat Preston. If not, we may wait for Wednesday evening’s results elsewhere and then aim to get the podcast out on Thursday evening.