Bradford City manager Mark Hughes has explained in The Yorkshire Post why Huddersfield Town loanee Romoney Crichlow can’t get his place back in the team
The 23-year-old centre-back has found opportunities at parent club Huddersfield hard to come by since joining them from Enfield Borough in 2017 and has sought first-team football through the loan system at clubs such as Swindon Town and Plymouth Argyle. This season was no different for Crichlow, heading back to League 2 this time with Bradford City. His season started promisingly, making 22 starts in the league before an eye injury in the 1-1 draw with Mansfield Town forced him to step out of the starting eleven.
https://twitter.com/rcrichlow_/status/1631357730672762881?s=20
Now, Hughes has discussed the difficulties facing Crichlow in his attempts to get his place back in the heart of Bradford’s defence. Bradford have now, including Saturday’s 1-1 draw with Newport, only conceded 4 goals in the last 8 games with the manager naming an unchanged back four in that time. “There’s confidence individually and collectively,” said Hughes who also praised January signing Sam Stubbs for adding to this.
He went on to praise the defender but pointed out that the consistency was working at present, with Bradford having suffered only one defeat in seven and find themselves just 4 points off the automatic slots. “Rom has been involved for a good part and had a really good season. He was unfortunate to go out of the team in the first place but, at the moment, it’s working for us. We look really solid and I’m loathed to break that up.”
Bradford’s next match is a trip to Harrogate where they will look to keep the pressure on the top three.
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Writer’s view
You would imagine that Crichlow is frustrated at being out of the team when he would have hoped to get as much game time as possible. With the current run of form his teammates are enjoying, it would be hard for him to be knocking on the manager’s door demanding changes to the solid and consistent eleven. If Bradford are to maintain a push for the automatic promotion slots then they will need all of their players available and Crichlow will no doubt be looking to play a big part in that.
