[NoSkillz]

Sat. September 28, 2024

Barclays Premier League
Dover (4-0-1, 12 points, 3rd) vs. Huddersfield (2-0-3, 6 points, 13th)
Crabble Athletic Ground, Dover, UK

Betting Odds: Dover: 2-5 (Favourites) Draw: 11-4 Huddersfield: 13-2
Past Meetings: 9W 2D 3L

Once again, we are monster favourites at home to Huddersfield, who are in their 10th consecutive year in the top flight in England. Huddersfield barely escaped relegation last year, finishing 16th only one season after being FA Cup finalists. Nelson Oliveira has been a constant up front for years at Huddersfield and has led the team in goals no less than 7 times, most recently in 2022/23. At 33 years old, he’s starting to slow down but once again leads the team with 2 goals in 3 games so far this year. They did bring in ten players in the offseason, spending £12.25 million overall, with £4.6 million spent on defender Carlos Phillips from Hercules and another £4.3 million on fellow fullback Brian Zakazaka, who was brought in from Girondins Bordeaux.

We’ll revert back to our main starting eleven, minus the injured Paul Moses, of course. The molten hot Andy Broomes starts in his place once again. My patience is wearing thin on Neil Cairney, who has been very poor this year and Arsene Bamba also has started very slowly. I’d like to see better performances from them tonight. Flat 4-4-2 and a control mentality today.

Dover: 4-4-2 Control
GK - M. Perez
D - Renato Gaucho, C. Contreras, R. Hamon, S. Loucif
M - A. Bamba, N. Cairney, Jose, G. Bolis
S - A. Broomes, Chiquinho
Bench - Rafinha, S. Nasri, E. Harvey, B. Raab, G. Allan, M. Pedersen, M. Lugo

Huddersfield start with a 4-1-3-2 formation with one DMC. David Caldwell, Huddersfield’s leading scorer last year, is up front with veteran Paul Lumsden. Dennis Lotters is a solid midfielder, as is Antonio and both are starting. Alex Smithies is the goalkeeper. The team always responds well to team talks that deal with entertaining our fans so I continue to ride that while also pulling aside Jose and Neil Cairney for personal chats.

26’ - We’re completely dominating this game but just can’t get the ball in the net. We look like we strike for one, as a Neil Cairney shot deflects off the crossbar before Chiquinho heads the rebound in but the assistant has his flag up before the ball even crosses the line. Chiquinho is ruled offsides and it’s no goal.

40’ - We have a corner and Jose’s cross is headed out to Cairney, who immediately feeds Jose near the left byline. Jose takes a step into the box and curls a shot from a ludicrous angle that goes past Smithies into the near side of the goal. RIDICULOUS strike from Jose and we get on the board. DOVER GOAL 1-0

HALFTIME - We’re not scoring an awful lot but I guess that’s to be expected when a guy who scored 59 last year is injured for 3 months. That said, we hold 63% of the ball in a commanding first half performance and outshoot them 12-1 (4-0 on target). Huddersfield aren’t moving forward at all right now but we would like one more goal to gain a bit of comfort. I encourage them to keep pressing forward.

67’ - Andy Broomes is having a poor game so we pull him out and bring in Manuel Lugo.

72’ - And all of a sudden, Huddersfield are all over us, with Manuel Perez making two spectacular stops and then Paul Lumsden takes a pass inside the area and scores. But wait…it’s called offsides! No goal!

75’ - Oh JOY. Manuel Lugo gets hurt and needs to come off. He’s got the dreaded cross above his head so we’ll hope for the best, as we will be in dire straits if another striker is out for a lengthy period of time. I bring in Graham Allan to play striker in his place. DOVER INJURY - Manuel Lugo

Huddersfield have moved to a flat 4-4-2 in an attempt to tie this game up.

83’ - The referee awards a PENALTY SHOT to Huddersfield when Renato Gaucho makes an ill-advised tackle in the area on a ball no where near a danger area. It’s substitute striker Martin Bekking on to take the kick and he fires one past a diving Perez and Huddersfield draw level to stun our crowd. HUDDERSFIELD GOAL 1-1

We take out Jose and bring in Benedikt Raab.

90’+1 - With four minutes of injury time, we switch to an overload mentality.

Another poor result at home.

Dover 1 - 1 Huddersfield
Goals - Jose (7.7)
Assists - Neil Cairney (7.3)
Man of the Match - Antonio Guzzetti (Huddersfield DC - 7.7)
Other Dover Notables - Claudio Contreras (7.1)
Attendance - 22,307

We ended up with 61% of the ball and a 23-5 (5-4 on target) shot advantage. Not enough quality in front of the goal with Broomes and Chiquinho and now we wait on Manuel Perez, hoping that a third striker isn’t hurt…

-- And it’s becoming apparent that we’re jinxed or something this year, as Manuel Lugo suffers a broken foot and will miss FOUR MONTHS. So Lugo, Zoltan Bardi and Paul Moses are all on the long-term injury list and that leaves us with Chiquinho and Andy Broomes as our only healthy natural strikers. Graham Allan, normally a winger, can play in a pinch and we have top prospect Alberto Velazquez on the U18 squad but he’s just a kid. Bardi is the closest to returning and should be back in training in about 3 weeks but it will be awhile after that to get him up to full fitness. DOVER INJURY: Manuel Lugo (Broken Foot - 4 months)

-- In other action, winners include Arsenal, Chelsea, Man United (over Spurs), Middlesbrough and Man City.


BARCLAYS PREMIER LEAGUE - STANDINGS
(ALL TEAMS HAVE PLAYED 6 GAMES UNLESS NOTED)

1. Manchester United - 18 points
2. Arsenal - 16 points
3. Middlesbrough - 15 points
4. Chelsea - 13 points
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5. Dover - 13 points
6. Newcastle - 13 points
7. Reading - 11 points
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Dover U18 Update

-- We get two goals from both Alberto Velazquez and Felix Hernandez in a 5-0 win over Brighton U18. Joshua Stokes notches the other goal and striker Matthew Neil adds two assists.



October Update

-- Another reasonably quiet month due to international play, with three league match-ups (Chelsea on the road, Blackpool at home and Liverpool on the road), Champions League games against Hoffenheim (road) and Palermo (home) and a 4th round League Cup game at QPR. So six games once again.

-- We get positive training reports for Andy Broomes, Mwemere Mutesa and U18 players Matthew Neil, Dennis Richter and Robert Hoffmann. Negative reports come in for Rayane Hamon and Paolo Secchi and i have a chat with both.



Premier League Monthly Awards

-- Chelsea midfielder Luis Carballo wins the Player of the Month award for September.

-- Claudio Contreras wasn’t even good in September from my recollection but wins Young Player of the Month once again. Mads Pedersen comes in third.

-- Andy Broomes finishes in second in the goal of the month award for a strike against Burnley. First place went to Derby’s Joao Henriques Almeida for a screamer he scored against us.

-- Man United’s Jurgen Klinsmann wins manager of the month once again and I finish in second.



Board Confidence Update

-- The board are very pleased with my overall leadership. Our stature increase is the positive and our loss to Newcastle is the negative.

-- We lost £2.16 million last month.



Champions League Update

-- Barcelona and Spurs battle to a 1-1 draw, as do Man United and Porto. Winners include HSV, Sevilla, Sampdoria, Olympique Lyonnais and Shakhtar.



Next Up

-- We head to Germany for Champions League group stage play, taking on Hoffenheim.