Mist, Madine magic and misery: Huddersfield Town vs the Mighty

I used to live in Huddersfield. It has an effect. I sometimes say "us' ouse" instead of "our/my house" but I will never ever stretch to describing a chip barm as a chip teacake. There are standards to maintain. 

Welcome to Yarkshire: Abandon all hope

It's a very Huddersfield day. Fog clinging to the hills. The slopes disappearing into a slate grey blanket that passes for 'sky'. Some might say this is 'dismal' but the folks from round here probably think this is a relatively tropical day. I once lived in a house about 3 miles outside Huddersfield and all there was to do was watch the rain, sleet and snow sweep up the valley. I quite liked the place to be honest.

The modern bit of Huddersfield...

If the day is typically West Yorkshire winter, the team selection seems weirdly un-Critch. You've got a Gary! With a Jerry! With a Sonny Carey! With a Viking for good measure. Lovely stuff. I absolutely adore it. Get into them instead of fannying about worrying what might happen if they get into you. ---

Civilised Lancashire types

Get into them we do. Bowler cuts out a loose pass and sets off down the right. This is the all new Josh Bowler though and instead of excitingly but ineffectively running to nowhere in particular, he less thrillingly but more effectively feeds Yates. Jerry has quite a lot to do but do it he does, putting the ball into the perfect spot beyond the keeper's grasp with laser guided accuracy, wheeling away after he's scored like his body is a counterweight to the direction of the shot. The sniper is back. If the goal against Peterborough was a bit clumsy/lucky, that was a beautiful finish.

At this point, young people would say #scenes - I am not a young person so I won't, but you get the general idea. Hang on... Huddersfield have (as they will do throughout the game) used width and hung a ball up in the box. Their player is barrelling onto it, Grettarson is looking a bit lost. Their player is meeting the ball. The ball is in the net. Grettarson is remembering what first team football is like. Fucking hell. That was a bit simple.

3 minutes gone and we're back where we started more or less. Game on. If the Viking looked rusty for the goal, he redeems himself with some well timed challenges and nice touches. Bowler is looking nippy, Jerry is full of life, Carey is full of the joys of youth and Keshi has finesse. This is a decent game. Grimshaw foils an effort at their striker's feet. We put a few in the box that Madine can't quite make a decisive contact on. Gaz comes deep. Gaz shields the ball. Gaz makes to lay off then send it the other way. We pass it about a lot. Gaz meanwhile trots innocently towards the edge of the box, moving like a bloke out for his Sunday paper and a packet of fags. Bowler has it. Gaz makes a little dash, as if he's seen the newsagent is about to close. Bowler has given it to Keshi. Gaz has broken into the box, he has his arms up now, he screams for it. Keshi loops the most delightful ball in, Madine leaps, he heads it down, the keeper reads it but though he gets his hand to it, it's in... YESSSSSS! IT'S MADINE!!! All goals are great goals but Gary Goals goals are the greatest goals. This was a peach. A lovely football move started and finished by Madine. This is turning into a great day! Pool are generally really good for the first half. We work a great move that ends with Yates putting it on a plate for Keshi to head wide. Gabriel puts wide from the same man as well and after a massive gap in play whilst Tom Lees is treated for concussion and Ollie Turton comes on, Sonny Carey either rattles the bar or forces a good stop from the keeper (I can't tell, I'm miles away) Huddersfield have their chances. They nearly equalise quickly and put a great chance over the top, but we are clearly the better side. The only real worry going in at half time is two daft yellow cards - one for Jimmy Husband for a shoulder charge and the other for Gabriel for what looked to me (i didn't see it that well) like a daft late attempt to tackle a player who'd already crossed it. --- We've been really good. I worried that when I said I like the line up that would immediately condemn it to being a disaster but we've played on the front foot. Madine had been at his best, both orchestrating and getting on to the end of things, Jerry is fizzing with effervescent Jerry-ness and looking a real player as he does at his best. The midfield is primarily concerned with getting the ball forward to those two and I like that. I hated the Callum Connelly in midfield thing and whilst this is putting a bit of pressure on the defence and the back line is looking a bit shaky at times, we've tried the 'sneak a one-nil win away' for the last x number of weeks and it's not worked. So let's try and sneak a 4-3. It's more fun that way. You can't expect us to attack, attack, attack and defend, defend, defend and I know which one I prefer... C'mon Pool! ---

Huddersfield manage a bit more pressure but we're dangerous on the break. Carey is delightful to watch because he's so good at picking it up on the edge of the box and you don't know what he'll do - shoot, chip it, lay it off or drive at their defence. He tries all the options and a couple of times they nearly work. He chips it through and for all the world it looks like Keshi is being held as he tries to run on to it. He runs at the box and it gets stuck under a series of players' feet and just as it nearly falls to Jerry it's gets nicked away. This is going well. They have, to our delight, a goal disallowed. Ha ha ha. 

The more they go forward, the more likely we are to score a third on the break. Here goes Bowler. This is the new look Bowler but he's still got the double edged thrill and frustration of the old one, tying his full back in knots, beating him, finding himself in the clear on the by-line and then just chipping it into the keepers hands. He's off again haring down the right. He runs straight into the full back. The ball pops lose and seems to be there for the challenge. Gabriel steams in. Their no 8 who looks to me, very much like Paul Scholes clears it though. Gabriel catches him. Shit. I've seen the red in the refs hand before he shows it. Fucking hell. 

Now I'll say it - this ref is fucking wank. He's totally inconsistent. Only fucking boring pricks who ring 606 go on about 'the consistency of refereeing from game to game' - refs, like players are human and have different styles and I don't mind if what is a yellow in one game isn't in another but this lad just seems to hand out cards according to whether he likes the player's hair or not and he obviously doesn't like Gabriel's highlights. He even booked one of their players for protesting that a player with a serious head injury merited stopping the game. What's a foul one minute is play on 5 minutes later. He's shite. 

This has fucked it right up. We play for a few minutes with Dougall at right back and Jerry dropping deep then take off the sniper and Bowler for Sterling and Keogh. We're going to try and shut up shop. In retrospect it's a terrible move as we just offer ourselves up for them, but at the time, I thought it was an attempt to try and get the full backs wider and dealing better with their threat from wide that made some sense. They make chances but we still manage to get the ball up the other end. Madine is a focal point and Keshi is managing to get onto the end of his flicks. Nothing so much as resembles a chance, but we're at least pressuring them. Keshi has a sensational run. No one is with him at all. He's been terrific, again.

 

Madine's number is up. We're still winning. Lavery comes on. Again, in retrospect, the minute the Goal Machine trots off, we barely manage to hold the ball in their half for more than few seconds but at the time, Shayne's chasing and harrying and two player's worth of energy seems the thing we need. 

When it comes, it hurts. They seem to shuttle it sideways a ridiculous amount of times before the last player at the end of the move slams it home. It felt more like a series of rugby passes than it did a build up to a goal. They've got those stupid big flags they wave for a goal. They can fuck off. 

 The third, I can barely remember. It seemed to bounce about, we hacked at it and missed it, it fell to a lad on the edge of the box who smashed it through the players in the box. The shitty flags wave again. Their fans sing a bit. The mist swirls. For fuck's sake. Football can fuck right off. This was going so well. 

Still, there's time. I wonder, as Critch throws big Marv up front he's been reading this blog and decided to grant my wishes. I doubt it somehow. We get a deep free kick. Everyone crowds the box. They head it away. Marvin is quite good at flicking it on but either no one gets to it or he flicks it to a lad in an offside position.

This has a grimply inevitable feel to it now.

 Grimly. Inevitably. The whistle blows. It's a cruel game. 

 ---

This was a match of if, buts, maybes. I don't know if Gabriel was unlucky. He certainly made two daft challenges but maybe on another day he gets a talking too for one of them. If we'd put one more of our first half chances away we'd have likely held on and not felt so inclined to make daft challenges. If we had stuck to two banks of four we might not have ceded the midfield and invited such pressure. If we'd had Wintle or Stewart fit enough to replace Carey (who played really well, but isn't perhaps the ideal man for a backs against the wall midfield) we might have felt more inclined to do so. If Keogh hadn't been out for so long, we might have been a bit more alert in the last 20 minutes. If the ref hadn't been a twat who made it up as he was going along then... You get the idea. If. But. Maybe. Fuck's sake. I'm still pissed off. 

That's football in a proper league though. It hurts, but it's the way it is. Any given week, you can win, lose or draw. We played really well for long spells but we played really poorly with ten men and got done again by a quick burst of goals. Huddersfield have been basically matched by us over the two games but have taken 6 points. After the Derby game, I said something like 'I'd rather have lost 3-2 and given it a go' - It's sort of easier just to say 'we were shit' though and today we weren't.

I'm trudging back in the mist and rain. I hear two Huddersfield fans saying 'Ah don't durn't knur why they tried to park the bus - they took their best player off too, that 11, he were brilliant - soon as he went, they were turtally predictable' 'Aye, it never works that. I mean, it must do sometimes otherwise managers wunt do it, but it never seems to to me' 

I'm trying to turn left onto the main road. Some cunt in a BMW beeps at me cos I've not got the nerve to mow down the kids on the pavement in front of me and am thus blocking his way out the car park too. Perhaps if you have brand new BMW you can mow kids down but last time I checked the highway code, it definitely suggested it wasn't good conduct. I think about getting out of the car and smashing his windows with my fist to make me feel better after that end to the game, but I think better of it. I think of Gary Madine at the far post instead. Fucking hell football. I'm fuming that we played so well and got fuck all. 

C'est la vie. Hopefully anger will be an energy on Wednesday. 

Onward!

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