Aiming to bounce back following a difficult Saturday afternoon, Huddersfield Town will welcome Blackpool to the John Smith's Stadium for a League One battle on Tuesday night. The Terriers suffered an embarrassing home defeat to Northampton Town on the weekend, whilst the Seasiders were victorious in the capital, getting the better of Charlton Athletic.
Following the jubilation of a four-goal success at promotion rivals Bolton Wanderers on September 14, Huddersfield Town have fallen back down to Earth after their first home defeat of the League One campaign, with the Terriers losing at the John Smith's Stadium to Northampton Town. Things started poorly for Michael Duff's troops in the opening 20 minutes as centre-back Michal Helik scored an own goal, before strikes either side of the half-time whistle from Cobblers pair Cameron McGeehan and Tariqe Fosu put the contest beyond Tuesday's hosts.
Rather worryingly, Huddersfield have lost four of their last five matches across League One, the EFL Cup and the EFL Trophy, including defeats to League Two outfits Walsall and Doncaster Rovers, meaning that spirits in Yorkshire need to be raised with a positive result against Blackpool.
Trailing only Mansfield Town's Lee Gregory in the early stages of the race for the third-tier Golden Boot, Josh Koroma has netted four goals in six League One appearances for the Terriers so far in 2024-25, with the attacker managing just six strikes across the entirety of last season.
Huddersfield will be desperately seeking to avoid a repeat of their most recent clash with Blackpool at the John Smith's Stadium in September 2022, when a solitary strike from Canada international Theodor Corbeanu was enough to seal maximum points for the Seasiders in Yorkshire.
Blackpool's new era under the experienced reign of Steve Bruce has started off swimmingly, with the Seasiders collecting six points from two League One matches against Exeter City and most recently Charlton at the Valley on Saturday afternoon. The visitors were handed the lead after an own goal from Addicks summer arrival Gassan Ahadme, before midfielder Albie Morgan doubled the Tangerines' advantage ahead of the first-time whistle, a strike that proved to be the winner of the capital contest against Nathan Jones's troops.
After half a baker's dozen of third-tier matches, Blackpool are occupying 13th place in the League One table, three points behind Lincoln City, who sit in the lowest of the playoff positions at this early stage of the campaign.
Managing just two strikes during the previous five campaigns at Bloomfield Road, centre-back James Husband has enjoyed a prolific start to the 2024-25 schedule, with the 30-year-old making the net ripple on three occasions so far this term.
The Terriers' Troubles
Despite a poor performance on the weekend, Huddersfield's Helik should keep his spot in the centre-back trio alongside Tom Lees and Nigel Lonwijk. On the other hand, there could be a raft of attacking alterations for the Terriers, with the likes of Joe Hodge, Freddie Ladapo and Bojan Radulovic pushing for starts.
The Seasiders' Strength
Blackpool have an array of options in reserve should Bruce opt to rotate his XI, with Jordan Rhodes and Jake Beesley settling for cameos at Charlton on Saturday. The Seasiders could bring in a wealth of experience to their backline in the form of Matthew Pennington, who featured at right-back in the second half at the Valley.
Potential Starting Lineups
Huddersfield Town possible starting lineup:Nicholls; Lees, Helik, Lonwijk; Sorensen, Hogg, Hodge, Wiles, Headley; Koroma, Radulovic
Blackpool possible starting lineup:Tyrer; Gabriel, Offiah, Casey, Husband; Apter, Evans, Morgan, Hamilton; Rhodes, Joseph
Duff’s Disappointment
After the disappointment of defeat to Northampton last time out, Huddersfield should be raring to get back to winning ways on Tuesday night. Blackpool have been impressive so far under the tutelage of Bruce, although we do not believe in the Seasiders' ability to extend their League One winning run to three matches. For data analysis of the most likely results, scorelines and more for this match please click here.
A New Mentality Required
When Huddersfield Town host Steve Bruce's Blackpool in League One on Tuesday, Duff will be anxious to see a very different performance from the one he and the John Smith's Stadium witnessed against Northampton Town on Saturday. At its most basic, he is looking for his team to run more having not seen enough of that in the 3-1 defeat.
But there was also a sense of mental fragility – of a calamitous own goal by Michal Helik rolling into a missed open goal from Josh Koroma, then a missed penalty by the striker – who, in his defence, did find the net for the fifth time this season.
How much was down to what was between the ears, Duff was reluctant to say, but he freely admits his club have a negative mindset to shift. “It's a Yorkshire trait, glass half-empty,” he says, and having grown up in Bedale and had a year as Barnsley manager, he is probably enough of an adopted Yorkie to get away with saying it.
Huddersfield must get to a different mental place after relegation, just like Sheffield United and Rotherham United this season. Unbeaten in the Championship, the Blades have done it well, the Millers are still getting there. Town are somewhere in the middle but 12 points from six games tells you they are much nearer the positive end.
Being in a different division means a different mindset says Tom Lees, playing in League One for the first time this season. “If you're fighting to stay in the league it's about getting a certain amount of wins, whereas now we've got to win the majority of games,” says the ex-Leeds United and Sheffield Wednesday centre-back. “The way teams play against you will be different and it's a different group of players. But fundamentally there are things in football that never change no matter what division you're in. You've got just got to try and do the right things more often than not.”
“People probably think we've got a big squad but I can't remember too many teams who have come down and cruised back up in recent years.”
It affects the way Town play too. “We've gone from being an out-of-possession team to having a lot more of the ball and that changes the crowd expectations of what is and isn't a good performance,” points out his manager. “We've gone from wanting to press high when we used to bank in. My last game for Swansea was against Huddersfield and we had 78 per cent of the ball. Lots of things have changed and mentality is the biggest one.
“I think the club got to a point where it was used to losing and a mentality of (he puffs his cheeks out) – we need to get rid of that. It doesn't mean you have to lose the next one because you lost the last one. It's not going to happen overnight. A lot of the squad were here last season so they're a little bit damaged by that but there's enough new faces and quality of the group. Culture's the buzz-word but we need to get into do the right things, habit-forming, so you don't worry about the result because it's a bi-product of what you're doing.”
The key is not to over-react either way, a strength of both, fortunately. “People might think I don't show too much emotion but I know how quickly it can bite you in the backside, getting too carried away by a win or a loss,” argues Lees. “I am not by any stretch dismissing what happened at the weekend at all but equally I'm realistic that at some point in the season it's not all going to go your way and that's when you've got to be able to focus on what's happening and not let it snowball into something else. It's one of my favourite things about the manager that he's very recently been a player and he's been in successful teams so he knows the mentality you've got to have.
“We've hardly celebrated winning because the performances haven't been the great. On Saturday we were poor and we don't need anyone to tell us that. We know we're going to have to be better against Blackpool. I'll take a win playing badly, don't get me wrong, but you know as a player whether you've been at it and you can feel it on the pitch if you're the better team.”
Free from new injuries, Duff will go searching for positives. “There's lots of signs of progress but on Saturday we took a punch on the nose,” he says. “It's recognising why we failed. The reaction wasn't great and we need to make sure if we do get a few moans and groans we stick together and get back to the process of why we've been successful. I'd like to think if we get beaten by Blackpool it's not because they ran harder than us. That would be the real disappointment. There weren't many positives on Saturday but there were a couple so we'll try to take them out of it because we need to be better.”
Looking Ahead
Huddersfield Town head coach Michael Duff is looking to see a “better performance” from his side against Blackpool tomorrow evening as they look to bounce back from their disappointing defeat to Northampton Town. The Terriers were beaten 3-1 at home to the Cobblers on Saturday, but have a quick turnaround to their next fixture, as they host the Seasiders at the John Smith’s Stadium.
Having shown his side where they went wrong on Saturday, Duff is hoping to see an improvement in Town’s display this evening. “Anything that could’ve gone wrong did go wrong. We turned down too many opportunities to play forward, didn’t run hard enough, didn’t come out of any duels [with the ball], gave poor goals away, missed a penalty,” the head coach said.
“Lots of things didn’t go right, so with the game coming so quickly, it’s an opportunity to put it right, an opportunity to try and put in a better performance. You’re not in control of the result, but we definitely need to put a better performance in. It’s the same [process] as what you try and do after the Bolton game (a 4-0 win). You watch it back, you take the good bits, the bad bits, where we can improve, and deliver that this morning, which we have done.”
“I’ve never been a ranter and a raver. It’s not the way I believe you want to work. I’ve played through that era, where managers would just tell you you were rubbish, and then tell you you were rubbish again, without actually giving you a solution and trying to help.”
“We’ve shown them the pictures of when we’re turning balls down to play down the sides more, and we’ve shown the second goal. It’s a perfect example of their players running past our players, it can’t happen. That’s what happens in football, if you take things for granted or you don’t run, you don’t win.”
Saturday’s defeat leaves Town sitting fifth in the League One table, on 12 points from six matches played. Tonight’s opponents are 13th in the table, on eight points from six games. The Seasiders have registered 2-1 victories against Exeter City and Charlton Athletic since appointing former Terriers’ boss Steve Bruce as head coach, and Duff highlighted the danger that tonight’s opponents could pose in attack. “They’re one of the bigger teams in the league, one of the fancied teams. Obviously an unbelievable manager, the level that he’s managed at,” Town’s boss added.
“I think they’re top of the expected goals league, so they’ve created more chances and better chances than anyone else in the league, so that tells you they’re a threat. They’ve won the last two league games under Steve, so we’ll have to be much better than what we were. You’ve got to park that up now. It’s another game, another opportunity, and hopefully we can get a good performance and result.”
Duff confirmed that the Terriers have a “clean bill of health” on the injury front heading into the game, aside from sidelined trio Radinio Balker, Rhys Healey and Chris Maxwell.
