Below are selected highlights from Monday morning’s press conference ahead of Town facing Northampton on Tuesday evening. You can find the full audio above or in your We Are Terriers podcast feed.
Lee Grant
Can we just start with your team news? How is everyone who was involved in in Cardiff, and can you welcome anyone back for tomorrow?
We’re OK. What I would say is that right now, we’re probably in the midst of a big bout of sickness going through the group.
We had, obviously Lynden Gooch not able to travel with us and be with the team for the weekend against Cardiff — that was due to illness, and unfortunately, what we’re seeing is that now migrate throughout the rest of the squad. We’ve had two staff members unable to be with us for most of the week last week as well.
So look, we’re going to be up against it in terms of the illness and the bug that’s traveling through the group, so we’ll have to really monitor that closely and be careful with how we travel down to Northampton.
Is there anyone you can categorically rule out for tomorrow, or is it just let’s see where we’re at?
What I would say probably on Lynden is it’s going to be really tough for him, having not eaten a great deal, not trained for a few days, still not feeling 100%, so it’s going to be difficult for Lynden, that’s for sure, for Tuesday.
We’ve got a few to manage on that side of it.
Between sickness bugs and injuries, it feels like you’ve had a lot thrown at you so far this season.
Yeah, look, I can’t deny that we’ve had too many injuries, too many of our senior ones not available often enough, too large a portion of the group injured at one time. And then, of course, now to be hit with a bout of illness in the group is not ideal.
But we can survive it. We’ve got a group that we believe in and trust, and we’ve shown that we can find a way through. So we will continue to do that.
Just on Cam Ashia as well, he started against Wimbledon, and then he was back on the bench at the weekend. I know he’ll be in contention to start, but just on Cam, how impressed have you been with him this season?
Cam’s doing great. He’s doing great. He’s obviously in the early stages of his own development, and what we know is that he can be exciting when given opportunity and time and space, and we want him to continue.
I think the aggression he’s shown with his play and the energy and enthusiasm that he has when he comes on to the pitch — and now, we’ve obviously seen his first start — [he can] be really impressive, and even at points in the [Wimbledon] game where we were worried whether he was going to be able to continue, and if his energy or fitness levels might take their toll, but he managed to get through that game really well, and I was really pleased with him.
We’ve obviously seen the other side, where it can be not as easy and be more difficult. We know that all of these games are going to be part of Cam’s development.
So trying to manage that quite carefully, because what we want to do is keep pushing him, keep challenging him, keep giving him opportunity as well, importantly, because we do want to keep and have him around this first team squad more often than not. What he’s showed is he’s earned the right for that.
So we’re really pleased with Cam. We obviously have to manage him carefully as well.
When you say assessing where you’re at as a group, where do you feel you are at this stage of the season?
The answer to that question is, if I’m being really blunt, we’re at probably where we should be at. (Ed: in the sense of ‘deserve to be at’)
Now, what I mean by that, if it sounds a bit black and white — what I mean by that is the league table, which in some respects I try not to pay too much attention to. But it also gives us a good guide as to where we sit, and the balance of this division, what’s been successful in the league, and how we fared against opposition, above and below and around.
I’m trying to take into context and into account all of those things right now, because we’re beyond the stage of 10 games, where we’re learning a lot about the group, and we’re trying to profile everybody correctly and understand who’s whose strengths are where. We’re at a point where we’re over a third in, and before you know it, we’ll blink and we’ll be halfway.
We have to be really clear about what it is that’s going to help us achieve our goals this year, and I’ve got to be really crystal clear on that, because I’m certainly not willing to let this drift into sixth, seventh, eighth, fifth in the division if my belief is that we can be better.
I don’t want to finish fifth in this division. I don’t want to be in and around sixth and fourth and fifth and seventh. I want us to be where I think we can be, what we’ve shown at periods and at points this year, which is really competing in the top four, challenging, pushing, establishing ourselves as a as a dominant force at the top end of this division.
That’s my belief, and I want us to get there sooner rather than later. As I say, with halfway rapidly approaching, these are the things that are on my mind currently.
