Luke Turner looks ahead to tomorrow’s game…
Next up for Blues is a trip to the John Smith`s stadium to face Huddersfield town in their penultimate away fixture of the season.
Both teams have nothing but pride to play for so I expect the game to have that typical feel of an end of season dead rubber.
It will still be a tough game for Gary Rowett`s men as The Terriers have plenty of talent in all areas of the pitch and David Wagner has made them a tough nut to crack.
The likes of Nakhi Wells, Harry Bunn and Rajiv Van La Parra are all players who have the quality to score goals, set them up and have a big impact for their team.
The way that Huddersfield now set up means that, when in possession, you won’t get a moments rest. Wagner likes his team to press hard with plenty of energy and has a similar style to Jurgen Klopp after working with him at Dortmund.
Blues players won`t have time to mess about on the ball and we need to match what Wagner`s side do. To do that, we need to pass the ball quickly and get it into the feet of our attacking players who can do the business in front of goal.
Rowett was very critical of the way his side collapsed against Preston on Tuesday as they surrendered a two goal lead to draw 2-2.
I am sure that he will encourage his players to not always play directly into the feet of Clayton Donaldson and instead, mix it up a bit by playing it down the flanks.
Keeping our shape will be crucial for us as we certainly didn’t do that in the latter stages against Preston. If we start playing without any real structure them we will be punished by the Huddersfield attackers.
Diego Fabbrini will have to be clever in finding space as the experienced Dean Whitehead will cover a lot of that space between their defence and midfield.
Playing to his strengths will play a big factor in whether we can get our attacking game flowing so playing the ball to him on the half turn is very important.
Getting back to our old selves should be the aim where we could come under pressure and then hit teams on the counter.
We haven’t seen that as much in the second half of the season and our recent form really hasn’t been good enough.
The aim now will be to surpass that points total of 63 we got last season so hopefully we can begin by equalling it with a win tomorrow.