Players get individual training instructions
HUDDERSFIELD Town have confirmed their stance on Championship squad training and been pro-active in ensuring the players have everything they need to stay ahead of the opposition.
Manager Danny Cowley, his backroom staff and the playing squad will be staying away from the PPG Canalside training ground until further notice following the latest Government advice for the coronavirus clampdown.
But
Cowley ever the man for fine detail - has made sure his players can carry out their individual training programmes to a tee while they are staying at home.
Town’s players - including the six on loan from other clubs in Emile Smith Rowe, Jonas Lossl, Kamil Grabara, Trevoh Chalobah, Andy King and Chris Willock - have bespoke training programmes tailored specifically for them.
But because they are not now returning in the immediate future - and the inference because of the Government restrictions on movement is that will be at least three weeks - Cowley has ensured extra specific training equipment has been delivered already to players’ homes.
Town sent out some specialist gear to enable players to fulfil parts of their individual programmes which they might not otherwise have been able to do over a longer period of time.
It’s an indication of how keen Cowley is to make sure the Town squad are a fit and prepared as they possibly can be through this lockdown period - it won’t be perfect, of course, but this is not a perfect situation for the whole of football and the whole of the country. All EFL matches have been postponed until April 30 at the earliest.
CHIEF executive Mark Devlin has acknowledged Everton loanee Jonas Lossl is unlikely to stay at Huddersfield Town next season, not least because he has taken a significant pay cut to re-join the Terriers.
That means the club will need to look to someone else to be their first-choice keeper whenever the 2020/21 season is able to resume - and there is significant uncertainty about who that might be.
Long-time back-up option Joel Coleman is out of contract this summer, and even if a new deal is struck, it seems unlikely that would spell a step up into the first team for the 24-yearold, who has seen three other keepers selected ahead of him this season.
The first of those was Liverpool loanee Kamil Grabara, who was Town’s number one until he suffered a head injury in the 2-1 win at Hull City at the end of January, forcing the club to make an unanticipated dip into the loan market to bring Lossl back to the club.
Grabara was initially really impressive between the sticks and barely put a foot wrong despite Town’s terrible earlyseason form, but errors began to appear as Christmas approached, with his dropped cross against Millwall and poor attempt at a clearance against Wigan costing the Terriers points.
If it’s not Grabara, there are plenty of
other young Premier League
goalkeepers
That was always to be expected from such a young goalkeeper and manager Danny Cowley went on the record after both of those mistakes to stick up for the player, pointing out that there had been plenty of other occasions when he had come to Town’s rescue.
Had he not picked up that horrible injury, he would have been trusted enough to stay in goal for the rest of the season.
There is always the possibility that Grabara’s services could be retained if a loan renewal could be struck with Liverpool. The whole point of his loan spell at the John Smith’s was to get exactly those kinds of errors out of his system, after all, and he has not repeated any of the most egregious mistakes he has made so far.
If it’s not Grabara, then there are plenty of other young Premier