Key questions facing Lee Grant amid Huddersfield Town slump

The Terriers have been backsliding over the past six weeks. What's going wrong, and does looking at Town's better performances offer potential solutions?

What’s the best use of Alfie May?

We were speaking to friend of the podcast Ali Maxwell from Not the Top 20 the other day, and he pointed out that Lee Grant is the third manager in a row — after Nathan Jones at Charlton and Chris Davies at Birmingham — to play Alfie May primarily as a number 10, rather than as an out-and-out striker.

There are good reasons for that. As we noted as far back as last summer, when he was first linked with Town, May’s finishing stats — and his shot conversion rate, in particular — are actually a long way from the top of the rankings when it comes to centre-forwards at this level.

May scored so many at Cheltenham and Charlton because those sides created boatloads of chances for him, to the exclusion of everyone else in their squad. League tables would suggest that playing to May and getting 20+ goals out of him was never a recipe for promotion.

But what May does give you is a lot of experience and industry. There is logic, then, in playing him just off a more clinical striker, where he can use his work-rate and wiliness to help in the build-up, claim assists, and chime in with goals.

That’s the theory — but it hasn’t worked for Town. Taylor and May have shared the pitch for 314 minutes across ten games in all competitions this season. In that time, the pair have scored just one goal each: May against Stevenage, and Taylor off May’s excellent pass against Peterborough.