We Are Terriers

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Why are Huddersfield Town top of the table? Because they have the quality required to make the difference in tight games.

That was on show in back-to-back home victories over Peterborough United and Wigan Athletic.

Neither game was straightforward for Town, yet on both occasions they were able to break down the opposition with real incision to make it nin…

Here are some of the edited highlights from the press conference — you can find the full audio above or in the We Are Terriers podcast feed, including Joe Low’s contribution.

Martin Drury

Quick check on Bojan Radulovic first — not involved on Tuesday night. You talked about just not taking any risks with him and a bit of fatigue. Is that still the situation, or is he back for Saturday?

No, he won’t be back unfortunately. He’s still got a little bit of an issue with his hamstring, so it’ll probably be a couple of weeks before he’s getting back involved.

Tuesday was precautionary because we thought it was a little bit fatigued, but we’ve investigated it a little bit further and there’s a little issue with his hamstring. It’s not a big issue, but something that we need to be mindful of.

And everybody else came through Tuesday okay? Same squad to pick from at the weekend, or is anyone back?

David Kasumu’s back fit. We need to look at how we manage and integrate him back in.

Obviously Ryan Ledson’s back fit but unavailable for the game.

And Radinio Balker is injury-free, so he’ll be in contention to be within the squad tomorrow. Probably not ready to start again.

That’s good news. Is he a little bit ahead of what you expected?

[The prognosis] was two to three weeks, so it’ll be two weeks tomorrow. He’s been banging the door down. He feels good and he wants to play.

The medics and the performance team are also doing their job of making sure that we bring him back in a safe manner. If you asked him, he’s fit, he wants to play. He’s probably not quite there yet, but he’s certainly in contention to be in the squad.

You’ve mentioned Ryan Ledson, so let’s address that now. The news coming out today is that he’s going to serve a three-match ban for comments made to match officials at half-time and after the full-time whistle against Sheffield Wednesday. Emotions run high, don’t they? What’s your take on that situation, particularly given how big you are on the culture at the club and the messages that sends out?

I think first and foremost, Ryan’s been a very, very good captain for us on and off the pitch. I know Ryan is a person who’s very, very passionate about us being successful and about the group being successful.

Of course, we have some standards and behaviours, and Ryan knew straight after that he probably shouldn’t have got involved to a certain extent.

I understand why — completely understand why. I’m sure there have been similar instances of this happening at other clubs across the country, but in this case Ryan’s been punished for it, so we have to deal with it.

It is what it is and we move on.

It’s always good to have good players available, absolutely, but at the same time, it’s three games. If anything, it’ll probably give him a bigger lift when he does come back, and maybe give the group a bigger lift when he does come back, so we have to wait a little bit longer.

He didn’t need to apologise to me. I don’t see it as a massive issue. These things happen in football.

If I spend all my time worried about that or concentrating on that, then I’m not really looking at what’s in front of us in terms of Wigan and the other games that we’ve got against really good teams.

So it is what it is. That sounds maybe a little bit blasé, but we just move on.

On Marcus Harness, you said the other day about how he’s had to play a lot of different roles, possibly to the detriment of his form. Is it about trying to find the right role for him consistently now, or is it trying to find places for him in your system game to game?

That’s the same for a lot of players that we’ve got. A lot of players have played different positions so far this season because of some of the injuries that we’ve had and the different types of game plans that we put together against different opponents.

Marcus is no different to anybody else, other than the fact that at the back end of last season in particular, he played almost every minute for us. He was a standout player. I appreciated everything that he did at the back end of last season. I thought he was amazing. He was fantastic throughout pre-season. He started the season really strongly.

But as I said before, we asked him to play in different roles, and that’s on us as staff — but he’s such a selfless person. Never once did he say, “It’s not really my position, I don’t want to play that.”

He was brilliant, and that’s because he’s such a team player.

But of course, we have good players in the group, and sometimes players play in positions and they excel, they do well and they deserve to stay in the team. That’s the healthy competition that we want.

No player, even if you’ve had an amazing career like Marcus, and we know how good he is and the qualities that he’s got, has a god-given right to start games. It’s about how we play and train every day.

Marcus has been exceptional on the training ground, so I know that when he comes on in a game or he’s called upon to start a game, he’s going to produce a level of performance that is only going to help the team. That’s exactly what I saw on Tuesday night, and he’s pushing very hard to start for us.

I know that when he does, he’ll be very, very good for us yet again.

So it’s pleasing for me that I’ve got that level of quality, both as a person and as a player, to give myself a headache really around team selection.

Right now, I think the group are in a good place in the sense of respecting where we’re at and how you get in the team and how you stay in the team, and understanding when you’re not in the team, sometimes it’s not because you’re doing anything wrong. It’s just certain game plans that we have.

We’ve seen you deploy him in the front line, in a front two and in the press as well. We know that even if he’s not having the best day on the ball, you always get a big shift out of Marcus. Is that a position we might see more of him in, particularly if Bojan is out for the next couple of games?

Potentially, yeah. We know what Marcus has got in the final third.

His goal against Notts County was exceptional as well, when he makes a move from the left-hand side in behind and takes it really cleanly and early, so of course he’s a goal threat. He’s just a good footballer. He’s a goal threat.

He played as a six away at MK Dons and helped us control the game as a deep-lying six. Then he’s in the box against Northampton scoring goals. So he’s just a talented footballer with a real gratitude towards everything that we ask of him.

Will he play at the top end of the pitch? Absolutely.

Might he play deeper down? Probably.

But I know he’ll do well with whatever he has to do.

We didn’t really talk about it the other night, but a goal for Ilias Bronkhorst. Do you want to see more out of him in the final third? Could that be an important moment for him?

We know he’s got loads of attacking threat and capabilities in the final third — that was the reason why he was brought to the club.

I think what he’s doing right now, he’s complementing players around him. He’s allowing Derens to produce the level of performances that he’s producing because of the support he’s giving him, the way he’s feeding him the ball, the way he’s supporting him on the outside or from underneath. So Ilias has had a really positive start.

I can’t pay any more respect to Ilias in terms of coming to a new country with a new group of players, and the way he’s started the season is absolutely crazy — how good he’s been, quicker than I would have anticipated.

But of course, yeah, he’s got the capability to score more goals. He’s a big lad and he can score from set plays. We want him to be a little bit more aggressive at the top end of the pitch because we really believe he can be.

At the other end of the pitch, he’s been really, really good for us and strong for us at defending that space. So he’s had a really positive start to his life at Huddersfield. Hopefully that continues.

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Here are some of the edited highlights from the press conference — you can find the full audio above or in the We Are Terriers podcast feed, including Archie Collins’ contribution

Martin Drury

Did everybody come through the Plymouth game unscathed? Are you looking at the same squad availability for tomorrow night?

Yeah, everyone’s available from the weekend — everyone came through the game.

We just have to be mindful that some players have not played as many minutes in recent times, and with some players we also have to be careful with their history of playing Saturday-Tuesday, Saturday-Tuesday.

So we’ve got a few that we need to take care of, a few that we need to look at tomorrow before we make a call on what the squad will look like.

But in terms of coming through the game on Saturday, everyone’s OK.

And Ryan Ledson and David Kasumu, I think you said last time, were closing in on a possible return. Is tomorrow night too soon?

They’re close. They’re really close. Again, we’ll make a call on that tomorrow.

They’re in full training now, so we’ll look at the squad first thing tomorrow morning, having had all the feedback from how everyone’s come through today from a performance and medical perspective, but they’re definitely close.

You’ve had a couple of days to reflect on the win down at Plymouth. On reflection, what pleased you most about that performance?

I felt our mentality was really good throughout the game. We know the challenge that you have when you go down to Plymouth, having been there previously, and the way that they play and the way that they try to impose themselves on you, so we knew it was going to be a really difficult game.

We felt technically and tactically we were able to impose ourselves on Plymouth, but that wouldn’t have been possible if our mentality wasn’t in the right place and we didn’t compete with the way they make the game, in terms of physicality and first and second balls, those types of things.

The dirty parts of the game, I felt we were really good at, then when we had our opportunities to show our quality in different moments, we attacked in a variety of ways. I felt we looked really, really threatening when we went forwards. So there was an awful lot to like.

On Saturday, you said you’d spend the coach journey home with your staff looking at Peterborough and use those hours to prepare for the game. But with the players, when they’re getting back at midnight on a Saturday, presumably they had a recovery day yesterday, you can’t do much with them on the training ground…so is it more about getting messages into them in the video room? How does it work when you’ve got this kind of quick turnaround after such a long away trip?

The travel certainly plays a part in that, and it slightly disrupts what you can do on the pitch naturally from a physical point of view, particularly with Plymouth being so far away.

The players were off yesterday, which is not normal when we have a Tuesday game – we’d normally be in on a Sunday.

But I just felt the nature of the game and how much they put into the game, and then the travel, as you rightly say, I felt they were deserving of it and the right call for them physically was to be off yesterday.

So they had a rest, they had a breather.

The staff were in yesterday. We worked yesterday to make sure today was prepared fully for them.

They came in today and we’ve not managed to do loads on the grass, as you say, because of the quick turnaround from Saturday to Tuesday and how much physically they put into the game on Saturday.

So we do exactly what we can do inside from an analysis point of view, and we’ll spend tomorrow before the game as well giving some more messages.

Hopefully the players will feel really comfortable and confident going into the game with what we’ve provided for them.

Something that came up on our podcast... we were talking about the number of substitutions you’ve used, and it is lower than the average for the division. Most managers are using four to five, and I think in a lot of games you’ve used two to three. What’s your outlook on that? Is it just a game-by-game thing? Do you see a benefit to using fewer subs? What’s the thinking there?

Probably not that deep, if I’m going to be totally honest.

Just in the game that we’re playing, I look at who’s performing well, who’s not, where do I think we need changes? We anticipate things that might happen in the game.

We anticipate the subs that the opponents might be making and the shape changes that they might be making based on the scenario of the game.

So we have a big meeting before every game about that, about what might happen in the game based on what’s been happening in their previous games. We’re fully prepared for what might happen in the game in terms of scenarios and the opponent.

Then, of course, we’re always conscientious in terms of where our players are at physically. We have an understanding of exactly what minutes we feel they’re capable of playing in each game. More often than not, we’re quite good at that, and the performance team are really good at that, guiding us as coaches.

I think if you look at tomorrow night’s game, then it’d be naive not to think that more substitutions might be needed due to the nature of Saturday to Tuesday, depending on what the starting team is.

But I don’t look at it as: we should make two, we should make three, we should make five. I just face the game, and as a coaching staff we face the game that’s in front of us. Of course, we’re prepared prior to the game, but within the game there are also things that you have to look at.

Do you think there can sometimes be too much emphasis on wanting to spare players minutes or manage them too carefully?

Yes and no.

I’m probably a little bit old-school in the sense that I think we have some really skilled people now in football and in sports science and everything.

But I remember growing up, it was the magic sponge. Someone came over with a magic sponge and you bounced back up, or put a bit of DP on and you were all right. Suddenly that’s changed and we’re really conscientious.

I get it because the game’s changing, the game’s got quicker and it’s certainly more physical than when I was younger playing, so I have to respect the professionals that we have with us who are really skilled.

But at the same time, I do probably challenge them a little bit every now and again in terms of what I think people are capable of. If you train in a way that you acclimatise players to that high load and to physical outputs that are right at the top of their peak, then hopefully that’s transferable into games.

I’d like to think you’ve seen that in some games this season, the way that we play and the way that we want to play. We haven’t had too many soft-tissue injuries this season. Some of the injuries we have had, have been a little bit innocuous. So I think we’re in a relatively good place in terms of that.

But yeah, I’m probably a little bit old-school in the mindset of: get up and carry on.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.weareterriers.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.weareterriers.com

Ten games into the League One season, Huddersfield Town are in the mix at the top of the table.

And after a statement win away to the previously table-topping Plymouth, this week’s We Are Terriers podcast can’t help but re-visit our hopes and expectations for the side this season.

What made Town so good against Plymouth? How did they stand firm in a way t…

Here are some of the edited highlights from the press conference — you can find the full audio above or in the We Are Terriers podcast feed, including Sean Roughan’s contribution

Martin Drury

We have to start with the end of the Sheffield Wednesday game and the penalty situation. A couple of days on, have you been offered any further clarity as to how that all unfolded?

No. No further clarity, no.

You didn’t have the opportunity to speak to the match officials? They’ve not given you any understanding as to how that all panned out?

No, nothing.

Does that frustrate you?

You have to deal with it, it’s part and parcel of football. I’m sure the shoe will be on the other foot at some point in the future.

You just have to get with it and deal with it, control what we can control, look at the things that we did really well in the game and look at the things that we want to do better in the game.

But in terms of decisions, you can ask for explanations, you can write letters, you can get replies. It doesn’t change anything. You don’t get extra points for it. So no, just leave it alone and move on.

We’re talking on Tuesday afternoon, so admittedly there are a good few days before you head down to Plymouth. In terms of the team, we saw Radinio Balker go off and Murray Wallace go off. Are you in any position to say whether they’ll be available for the weekend?

Yeah, neither will be available. Murray will be out for about eight weeks, Radinio Balker will be two to three weeks.

So yeah, we’re in a bit of a situation with injuries at the minute. We’ve got seven players out now.

What that does is provide opportunities for the players to come in, but of course, you go to Plymouth, who are statistically one of the most direct teams in the league, and you lose two of your best aerial defenders.

It’s obviously frustrating, but at the same time we’ve got other players that can do that. It’s disappointing that we lose more players.

Murray’s is his knee…when he blocks a shot, he opens up the ligament in his knee. Radinio just had a little bit of tightness in his hamstring.

So yeah, frustrating, disappointing, but at the same time we move on and find solutions.

And just to clarify as well, there was some conversation about Sanches Fernandes maybe having hurt his knee. Is there anything in that?

He’s got an ongoing issue with his knee that he’s had for a while that flares up. It’s nothing too concerning, but we are led a little bit by him himself.

So in the game on Saturday, he signalled to us that he needed to come off, which is a shame because up until that point he’d been exceptional yet again — but I’m sure he’ll be fine for the weekend.

As you say, that’s such a blow to lose two of your key defenders at the same time. I guess that’s where your squad comes to fruition, isn’t it? You have to turn to the next man on the rank, if you like.

Yeah, absolutely. We obviously lost Jack Whatmough for 10 weeks, then Murray for six to eight weeks, and Radinio for three weeks, so it’s difficult.

I think any squad in this league, if you lose three players in one position in a short space of time, you’re going to find that a real big challenge.

But as you rightly say, we build a squad to ensure that if things like this happen, then we’ve got other players, good players, who can come in.

But of course, we’re probably in that position where we have to be very careful now because any more and we’ll be in a really difficult situation.

We embrace the challenge, we find solutions and we look forward to the game.

Does that make you consider maybe a slight formation tweak to compensate for that?

I think you have to consider everything, don’t you?

The best part of being in this role is you get these challenges where you have to find the solutions.

Whether that’s personnel, whether that’s shape changes, whether that’s approaches in different games, that’s the nature of the role.

So that’s for us as a staff and us as a group of players to work out solutions to any problems that we face.

That’s always our approach, and that’ll be no different at the weekend.

Any news on Ryan Ledson and David Kasumu?

No different to what I said five or six days ago, they’re in the same position: they’re training, they’re on the grass, and they should be, if everything runs smoothly, available potentially a week on Saturday.

It does leave you a bit short at centre-back. I think you’re down to three. Does that mean you might have to look at the academy and call some players up, even if it’s just for the bench?

I’ve not decided on that yet. We’ll have a look at how this week looks and we’ll decide closer to the travel day.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.weareterriers.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.weareterriers.com

Huddersfield Town’s 2-2 draw with Sheffield Wednesday was certainly eventful, to say the least.

Martin Drury’s side looked to be set for victory after going two goals up, but ended up sharing the spoils after Ibane Bowat’s own goal and a controversial late penalty.

That gives this week’s We Are Terriers plenty to go at as we try to dissect what Town got s…

Martin Drury

Just a quick word on the last two games. Is that the perfect platform going forward?

It’s certainly a much more positive reaction than to the game we had previous to that down at Bromley, when we didn’t get the result that we wanted.

We had that two-week window, the international break, where the players worked incredibly hard. We didn’t have too many days off.

So yeah, I was really pleased for all the players that we managed to deliver a performance last Saturday that was in keeping with our identity, how we want to play, how we want to look and feel.

Then it moved into Tuesday, where a lot of players were able to get minutes, and again we looked like us against Rochdale.

So yeah, the two games have been really pleasing, and definitely a nice way to react from the disappointment in the previous game.

Going into the season, those of us in the media will look at your game with Sheffield Wednesday tomorrow and say that’s an early test between two promotion favourites. How are you viewing it?

It’s a really important game for both clubs, of course, because we’re both ambitious, we’re both local to each other, and we’ve both probably, as clubs, had some testing periods over the last few years.

So I think it’s quite a fitting encounter. It’s one that we’re really looking forward to and excited about.

We’re under no illusions how difficult the game will be, having watched their games, knowing their squad and what they’ve done over the summer.

I can completely understand why they’d be deemed as favourites for the league in the summer by many people.But like you rightly say, it’s a challenge that we’re looking forward to.

We want to test ourselves against another team that we’d like to place ourselves amongst in terms of being ambitious and where we want to be at the end of the season.

It’s come at a time that I feel we’re ready for, and all the players look very ready for. We’re very excited about tomorrow.

Would it be a statement if you were to get the win tomorrow?

No, I wouldn’t say it’s that. I don’t see winning a game of football in October as any statement, if I’m honest. I think the statement will be at the end of the season, when we finish where we want to finish or not.

It’s a game that we’re looking forward to. We know it’ll be tough. Hopefully the place will be rocking tomorrow — I’m aware there are a lot of tickets being sold by both clubs, so hence why we’re so excited for it.

We hope the atmosphere is right. We hope the atmosphere is really, really good, and we hope people come and enjoy it.

We want to provide a performance that our fans can resonate with and be really proud of.

We touched on it after Tuesday, your reaction to Alan leaving the club. You said you would explore options if you felt that was necessary. Appreciate it’s only three days on, but have you had any more thought on that?

It’s been difficult to think about, to be honest, just with the preparation for the next game coming so quickly and the debrief from the last game. So we’ve not had loads of time on it.

I think we’ll pick that one up after this weekend and we’ll look at that in a bit more detail. I’ve had brief conversations about it, but certainly not gone into it in any detail yet, so there’s no clarity on what we’ll do next and how we move forward with that.

But as I said after the game the other night, I feel really confident with the group of staff that we’ve got.

Dale’s got bags and bags of experience at this level, and Steady, as we know, as a player and a coach, has got experience. There are other people in the building with experience of this club and further afield, so I feel like we’ve got a really good group of staff.

But of course, when somebody leaves, it gives you an opportunity to identify if there’s anybody else that you’d like to bring in, and what qualities and capabilities they might have to add to the group of staff.

Everything will be done with the thought of the players first. Anyone that comes to the club, it won’t just be about how they integrate with staff. It’ll be: do I feel they’re worthy of coaching this group of players? Because it’s a privilege to coach this group of players.

So anyone that comes in, we’ll make sure that they add to what we’ve got and they’ll be there to help the players.

Joe Taylor played the first half on Tuesday, so good minutes for him, but you’ve got a decision to make everywhere – and at centre-forward in particular. It’s a tough one this weekend, isn’t it?

It’s a good problem to have, right?

Joe started the season really well, scoring goals.

The work rate that he was showing in the early games in particular was exceptional, and I think that’s why he was getting his rewards with his goals. Ashley Fletcher, as we know, last season scored 20 goals, brilliant this season. He’s taken a little bit of time to get his goals, but some of his performances have been really, really strong and he’s scored two in two.

So of course it’s a decision to make.

There’s Bojan alongside that as well, so we’ve got three really good strikers, and then Samson’s obviously pushing as well. He came on on Tuesday and showed some of his qualities, and we’re working with him to keep getting him up to speed.

Of course, it’s good problems to have. Later on in the season, as we know, we won’t have all four available. We’ll be down to one or two because that’s the nature of football. We’ll thank the medical staff and thank the performance staff that we’ve got.

Bojan Radulovic

Is it fair to say you enjoy playing with both Ashley and Joe — and it seems like you and Joe in particular enjoy playing with each other.

It depends on the team we face and what the game is demanding in that moment. I like playing with any of them.

I think all of us are great players and we can do whatever the game needs.

I think that’s also an important thing we need to have in the team.

The team scored plenty of goals last season as well, certainly in the first half of the season, but with the likes of Derens [Sanches Fernandes] coming in, you finding form and Joe coming back, does it feel like there’s more threat this season?

Probably more threat and more depth in the squad, so we can use different profiles and different players for different games, or when we need different attributes to put into the game.

That’s probably what we were missing last year – maybe that creativity in the final part, with Derens.

So I think it’s an addition that we’re really, really enjoying as a team and as a group, and that is really helping us.

Are you particularly pleased that you’ve been able to keep things going and stay in the side despite missing so much of the summer? You didn’t play in any of the friendlies, then had another setback at the start of the season, but you’re still in contention, starting games and playing well. What’s the secret, because a lot of players can struggle with that kind of thing?

Yeah, it’s not easy.

As I said, it depends how you handle it, how strong you can stay mentally and just take it as a normal part of football.

It happens as a player that you get injured.

The timing probably wasn’t perfect, but if you have to choose – obviously you would choose never to get injured – probably you’d choose the beginning, where you still have the whole season in front of you to play and have the minutes you need and want.

In the beginning it was a little bit frustrating, but I think the management of my minutes and how they’ve handled it has been perfect.

There are no easy games, but when you look at the fixtures coming up – Sheffield Wednesday, Plymouth, Bradford, Luton – there are some big games there for your season as a whole, aren’t there?

Yeah, they are big, big games for us as a team, and they’ll probably help define our future in the season.

If you win those games, you’re going to be up at the top and you probably lay down a marker that we are here.

So they’re going to be huge games for us, very important ones.

But I think we always have to be humble and treat every game as an important one, with humility.

If we do what we’ve been doing since the start of the season, I think we’re going to be in a good position.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.weareterriers.com/subscribe

Here are some of the edited highlights from the press conference — you can find the full audio above or in the We Are Terriers podcast feed.

Martin Drury

It’s an opportunity to give some players who maybe haven’t had that many minutes a go, but is it also a chance to start reintegrating players you might have back and available? Are you in that situation with some of the injured players yet?

Yeah, definitely. Sean [Roughan]’s obviously just coming back. He’s fresh coming back, so Sean’s ready for some minutes. Samson [Tovide]’s ready for some minutes.

We’ve got players coming back from injury. A couple more we’re still waiting on who are not quite ready, but the ones that are ready will definitely get some minutes tomorrow night.

So it’s a chance for players that, again, are not playing the amount of minutes that they’d like to play. I feel guilty that I’m not able to provide that for them at this moment in time because I know how hard they’re working in training.

They’ve been outstanding in terms of their mentality and how they’ve gone about every day, so it’ll be great for them to get some minutes.

But again, it’s not just a game to get minutes for players. It’s a game for us to go and win, to compete and to continue developing the way we want to play, respecting the opposition.

We were just talking to Lynden, and he was saying he wants to lay down a marker. There are a few players in your squad in that position, aren’t there? Are these games quite important for those players to put themselves in your thoughts? If they perform well against Rochdale, against Liverpool, does that potentially bump them up the list for you?

Of course. It’s an opportunity for people that have not been playing minutes to go and try and impress — but they wouldn’t be surprising me by impressing because I know how much they’re doing in training every single day.

So my expectation is that they would produce a performance tomorrow that is in keeping with what we’ve done so far this season. I know the qualities and the attributes of the players that we have.

Lynden is a great example. The fact that Lynden sat here saying that he wants to go and lay a marker down and wants to go and impress says more about Lynden than anything else.

I know what Lynden’s capable of, as I do many of the other players that aren’t getting the minutes that they would like. I know how good a footballer he is and how good footballers they are.

So they don’t need to prove anything to me, for sure. But yeah, I do quite like that Lynden’s here and he said he wants to do that. That’s testament to him.

Hopefully the other players in the group feel that same way tomorrow night.

Does that go for the goalkeepers as well? There have been a few people looking at Matty Young over the past few games and thinking: could he have kept this goal out, that goal out? Is there an error there? Are the other goalkeepers pushing Matty as well?

Of course, yeah. I think every player in the building has to feel like they have an opportunity.

If they perform, if they’re conducting themselves every day in training, if they’re contributing to the culture and impressing with what they’re doing, then everyone has to feel – and they absolutely do have – an opportunity to force their way into the team. They’re the problems that I want to have.

What we have had is really good performances from the whole squad in the majority of games this season, so it’s been difficult for us to change players, but we’ve tweaked it in small, subtle ways against certain teams for the game plan of that game.

Sometimes players aren’t playing through no fault of their own, and I feel bad that I can’t do anything about that at this moment in time — but look, they’re all heading in the right direction.

I have absolutely no doubt that as the season progresses, as we start to progress through to the winter and different types of games and different things happen within a squad, people are going to get opportunities.

The only way to be ready for that opportunity, whether you’re a goalkeeper or an outfield player, is to make sure that you’re giving everything every single day in training. That’s what I’m seeing right now.

Hopefully tomorrow night, again, is an opportunity for people to go and stake a claim.

While I’ve got you on Matty, what’s your take on it? Are people being a bit harsh? Is there merit in some of the criticism? Is he disappointed with some of the goals he’s conceded? Where is he, and where are you on him?

I know how ambitious Matty is and how conscientious he is about his own performances and how seriously he takes his own career and his development.

So of course there have been moments within games that I’m sure Matty will have wanted to be better in, and there have also been moments in games where Matty’s been outstanding for us.

He’s 19. He’s on his second senior loan. I’ve been really impressed with so many things that he’s done.

He’s given us things that last season we didn’t quite have in certain moments that don’t always get noticed. Sometimes they go under the radar.

So we’re really pleased with where Matty’s at — nut of course, like any player, there are outfield players from Saturday who will want to be better in front of goal. There are players who want to be better receiving under pressure in the middle of the pitch. There are goalkeepers who want to be better in certain moments.

So look, from where we’re at, Matty’s developing nicely. But of course, the standards that we expect and the standards that we set are very much in line with Matty’s.

So I know that he’ll want to keep improving and keep developing, and I’ve no doubt that he will.

Lynden Gooch

This season has obviously been frustrating for you personally. How have you found dealing with not playing as much as you’re used to?

Yeah, personally, I think you could say that.

Throughout my career, it’s the first time I’ve not been playing most weeks, so it’s a new challenge.

But look, I’m not one to roll over and just accept defeat. I’ll work as hard as I can every single day.

It’s testing, of course it is, mentally more than anything.

I’ve been in tough situations before in my career — challenging seasons, bad results, losing big games, big finals and stuff like that — but I’ve not really had this situation before in terms of the amount of minutes I’ve played.

I can’t just roll over and accept defeat, kick and scream and want to be out of the football club. I’ve seen plenty of players do that.

I’m happy here and I’m happy to fight for my place.

Every player we’ve spoken to has talked about how intense it is under Martin. What has your experience been of working under him?

Yeah, the same. Very intense. Brilliant coach tactically. The intensity is high.

Even though I’ve not played as much as I want, I say the same thing to everyone: I think he’s a really good coach. I think that’s showing at the minute.

And I think we’ve got a talented squad. Every single player wants to play, and I think you’ve got a problem if you’ve got players who are happy being here and not playing. That’s what the driver is for us.

I think that’s why you’re seeing the results on the pitch, because you’ve got 25 players going at it every day in training trying to get in the team. So if someone doesn’t do their job, doesn’t pull their weight, then someone’s ready.

I think that’s what you’re seeing at the minute.

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Here are some of the edited highlights from the press conference — you can find the full audio above or in the We Are Terriers podcast feed.

Martin Drury

Can we catch up on the injury news first? Ryan Ledson, obviously Bojan Radulovic, Sean Roughan as well. Where are we at with the squad?

Ryan’s progressing well. He’s on track. He’s still a few weeks away, but he’s back on the grass, he’s running, and he’s just managing that pain that he’s got from the injury initially.

But he’s in a good place. He’s progressing at the speed we’d expect him to, so he’s on track.

Sean’s available for the weekend. Sean’s been training really well, looks really good, looks strong. Pleased with his attitude. We’ve almost had to pull him back a little bit and hold the reins on him because he’s itching to get going again.

Bojan is fit and available. He had a back spasm, recovered from that, so he’s available.

David Kasumu is progressing really well. Probably a couple of weeks away, on the grass running. He’s getting stronger every day and working incredibly hard, so he’s not too far away.

Then we’ve got a couple that we’re sort of nursing a little bit. Derens should be OKfor the weekend, but it’s an ongoing little niggle in his knee. He’s had it for about three weeks now, so we’re trying to protect that a little bit. Fingers crossed he’ll be okay for the weekend.

Jack Whatmough’s injured again. He’s suffered an injury in his calf, which is frustrating for Jack, frustrating for us. We trained on Saturday morning and he felt his calf in the warm-up for training and dropped out. We’ve not got an exact diagnosis of that yet, but with calf injuries – and Jack’s had some calf injuries in the past – they’re never a quick thing.

So it’s really frustrating for Jack. I feel for Jack because I know how hard he’s working and how much he wants to be back a part of it. Unfortunately he’s broken down again, so we’ll have to look after him, and I think he’ll be out for the upcoming games.

You mentioned Radinio. Are there any doubts about him going into your side this weekend after a very long trip back, or is he in contention?

No, no, fully in contention.

Obviously we do know about jet lag, so we’ll assess him as soon as he’s back in the building.

We’ll see him tomorrow, we’ll see him Friday.

My expectation right now is that he’ll be fit and available for Saturday, which I’m over the moon about because he’s been outstanding.

But yeah, as soon as we see him, we’ll have a clearer picture on that.

And obviously with Joe Taylor away with Wales, I assume that’s going to be the case come this weekend as well. Have you basically got enough to go into this game?

Yeah, we’ve got enough. Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely.

We’ve got enough first-team players, we’ve got enough B-team players, so we’ve absolutely got enough players in the building with talent, players that want to work and players that want to play — so we’ve definitely got enough.

But obviously it’s frustrating when you have an international break and you want to try and get people back. Everyone’s progressing on track as they were, but it’s frustrating when you lose one.

Samson Tovide, we’ve no injury concerns. We’ve been trying to push to get Samson up to speed and then he suffered with tonsillitis. We didn’t see him for quite a few days, he was at home, so he’s been unwell and the docs have been treating him.

Again, you see the international break as a good opportunity to get him up to speed, then you get punched in the gut a little bit because he picks up an illness. We’ve had a couple of other illnesses as well, over different days.

So look, nothing to complain about. That’s what happens. You deal with it, and we’ll be fully prepped for the weekend.

So how does that leave you up front coming into the game? Because it probably does limit you a little bit, doesn’t it?

Well, if you’d have said to me at the back end of last season, “You’ve got Bojan and Fletch available for a game,” I’d have snapped your hand off. So I definitely won’t look at those two and go, “We’re short up front.” Absolutely not.

Samson’s pushing to be involved at the weekend, but he’s just not fitness-ready. He will be pushing to be involved, then we’ve got a number of other players that can play at the top end of the pitch.

So it’s not something we’re concerned about. It’s the nature of football.

It’s amazing for Joe that he’s been selected to go with his country. That’s testament to all the work that he’s been doing, testament to the goals that he’s been scoring. Credit to the staff that have supported him since his comeback, but definitely credit to Joe himself. I think if you’d have told Joe 12 months ago that he’d be in and around the Wales squad, then I think he’d have been over the moon.

So that’s a brilliant, brilliant representation of how he’s gone about his business in the summer and how he’s started the season.

Of course, that means we miss him in a game, which is frustrating. But look, it’s brilliant for him.

Then Radinio Balker is slightly different, in the sense that Radinio came to see me before he went to the international break and said: “Look, we have four games. I don’t want to play all four, and I don’t want to miss a game for us, so I’m going to speak to them and see if I can play two games and come back. I don’t want to miss Burton Albion away.”

Would Radinio have said that 12 months ago? I don’t know. But it’s music to my ears when he’s coming knocking on the door saying: “Look, I don’t want to miss a game. I want to come back and play.” So that’s credit to him and tells you where his mentality is.

I think his performances have been very, very high, and hopefully he continues in that way and keeps playing really well.

Does that reflect well on the culture that you’ve set here as well?

I’d like to think so, but it’s more about him.

It’s about where he’s at, and I think you can see in his performances, the way he’s playing, the way he’s training, the way he’s carrying himself.

We’ve had some challenging conversations, but he’s such an intelligent guy. He loves his football, he wants to win and he wants to compete.

The fact that he’s got the chance to go and play in four international games, but he’d prefer to play in two and then come back and play at Burton Albion away on the Saturday, is testament to where his mentality is right now.

So full credit to him, and we hope he returns in good condition tomorrow and we’ll have him for the weekend.

Where are we at with Cam Ashia at the moment?

Cam’s obviously been here for a period of time. Cam’s a player that I really, really rate in terms of his potential.

I think he could become a very, very good player. I think he’s got a lot of capabilities that can be worked with.

I think he’s got an edge about him as a player that I don’t think you can coach. I like that about him. He’s got an edge, he’s got personality and character.

There have been times when I would have liked him to channel that in a better way, and I would have liked him to understand that contributing to a squad and a culture takes, at times, a little bit of selflessness and humility.

But Cam’s on a journey. He’s on a journey with that. We’re on a journey with him as staff.

We’ve got massive belief in Cam. He’s had a difficult period being out injured and then coming back and not quite being right, so he’s had a tough few months.

But Cam understands exactly what is expected of him for him to come into our thinking, to be a first-team player and to be playing games for us. It’s an ongoing thing for us to work with him.

I have to say, he’s joined in sessions with the first team and he’s been brilliant. Really, really good. Looks strong.

I know he played yesterday with the U21s team. I watched that game last night and he had some good moments, and there are some moments that we need to help him improve if he wants to come and play games and start games for us.

So Cam’s very aware of where he’s at, and we’ll continue to work as hard as we can to make sure we maximise his potential.

As I said before, we rate him so highly in terms of what he could be, but we have to get to work to create that.

Murray Wallace

Where’s the focus been for you? What have you been concentrating on?

We’ve just been looking forward to the next game, really.

It’s one of those where you look at the international break and some people might think [we’d be like] “brilliant, bit of time off” — but where we’re at, we kind of hoped to keep playing throughout the break and keep the momentum going that we had.

Obviously the result previous to the break wasn’t ideal, and you don’t want to have a long break after a bad result. You just want to crack on to the next game.

Have you had some time off, though? How did you spend it?

Yeah. Obviously after our trip down to London and a bit of a busy schedule, we got a couple of days with family and stuff, which was nice — but now we’ve pretty much just been in as normal, training and, like I said, looking forward to the next game.

How would you say you’ve reacted to the defeat at Bromley?

Just obviously coming back to that frustration with the result, really.

In terms of the chances we created, the chances they had, and for the scoreline to be 2-1, it was disappointing.

We felt that we should have scored more and we were disappointed with the goals we conceded.

Like I said, you get a bad result, the next thing you want to do is go out and play the next game and get a good result.

That’s obviously where we’re at and what we want to do, so we’re looking forward to this game.

It was a defeat, but defensively you look at it and you’ve got two clean sheets this season and a good record. I think it’s only Bradford that have conceded fewer so far. Has the focus been more at the other end of the pitch over this last week or so?

No, not necessarily.

I think the reason we’re creating so many chances and the fact that we’re such a goal threat is because we do a lot of focus on attacking and finishing off attacks, and we’ve got real belief in creating chances.

Obviously we’d want to be finishing more of them off, but we feel good about where we’re at in terms of creating chances, and obviously we want to finish more of them off.

But just as importantly, there’ll be games where things just aren’t going the way you want them to be and we’re not creating as many chances.

That’s where you’ve got to be defensively sound, and we work on that just as equally hard.

Does it feel a bit different to last year? I think there were a lot of games last season where you ended up dropping points, disappointing results, and you looked at the stats and thought, “Yeah, I can see why they’ve not got the result they wanted.” But when you look at the numbers this year, you’ve had 18, 19 shots in the last three league games, plenty of shots on target, xG in your favour. Does that make it feel different as a player, or is it just as frustrating and difficult?

I suppose it’s one of those where the stats can all look great, etcetera, but if the result doesn’t go your way, then as a player you don’t exactly feel that reward.

At the end of the day, we work so hard throughout the week and in everything we do.

Yes, we’ve got style and all that, but the result is of the greatest importance at the end of the day.

If you don’t get those three points, then regardless of how well you’ve played, how many chances you’ve created, etcetera, you’re obviously still going to be frustrated.

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With no game this weekend, we have a Q&A special for you in this week’s episode of the podcast…and we’ve even stuck it out a day early for you.

Thank you as ever to everyone who sent in questions - and if yours didn’t get answered, don’t worry, we’ll be mopping up the rest in a written section of the Q&A in the next day or two.

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