Huddersfield get away with one to end barren spell
WHEN you are more than 12 hours without a goal away from home, sometimes it can feel like luck has deserted you.
Huddersfield Town, though, got their fair slice of good fortune and pounced on it to trounce Watford.
Elias Kachunga’s goal that ended a 738-minute, four-month barren run involved two incorrect offside calls before a second bounced in that scorer Aaron Mooy knew little about.
But make no mistake, this was a well-deserved victory for David Wagner’s men against their imploding hosts who had Troy Deeney sent off before Laurent Depoitre and Mooy again made the win emphatic.
Hitting three goals at Crystal Palace on the opening day of the season must have felt like an awful long time ago for Huddersfield. Wagner even admitted that on-the-road goal drought had been playing on his players’ minds. But they ended it with a deluge of goals.
‘We were very brave, we went in their faces,’ Wagner said. ‘The extraordinary thing for me is that with this poor away run in the back of your mind, to perform like we’ve done is so brave. It shows mental strength.’
Kachunga’s opener came from a goalmouth scramble at a corner, with the assistance of the officials.
Christopher Schindler backed in from an offside position, taking down a touch from Mooy six yards out before shooting across goal. Kachunga, offside too, tapped in at the back post. Drought over.
Watford manager Marco Silva refused to criticise the referee or his assistants, but the feeling of injustice was clear.
Perhaps they lost focus with that. There was not much of a rallying before Mooy knocked in the second goal, the ball bouncing off him and in from Collin Quaner’s low cross as Watford’s defence first failed to track anyone.
Deeney was not getting a kick up front and then decided he was better off getting involved in the defensive side, lunging in, studs-up, at Quaner’s ankles when he was going nowhere. Watford’s captain approached referee Michael Oliver after the game to complain but it was a foolish challenge to make and made his team’s challenge even harder.
The home side continued to cause their own problems and after half-time Depoitre added Huddersfield’s third goal, charging through to clip the ball into the net after Jose Holebas had fallen under a challenge inside the area to create the gap.
‘We made mistakes you cannot make at this level,’ Silva conceded afterwards.
Abdoulaye Doucoure pulled a goal back for Watford with a thumping half-volley from 25 yards after the visitors saw Jonathan Hogg dismissed for two yellow cards, but then proceeded to give away a penalty, tripping Depoitre in the area.
Mooy stepped up and slammed the ball beyond Heurelho Gomes. This was the first time Huddersfield have hit four goals in a top-flight game since 1956. On 21 points, Wagner says that they are half-way to surviving in the Premier League.
At the end, every Huddersfield employee on the pitch and from the bench went over to salute the raucous away end.
‘They’ve supported us like they’ve done today in the away games and we haven’t given them so much to celebrate!’ Wagner said.
Huddersfield are up to 11th. There will be plenty more to cheer if they carry on like this.