Huddersfield Town owner and chairman Kevin Nagle has admitted that sporting director Mark Cartwright “did everything” that he asked him to do during the January transfer window.
The Terriers find themselves in the unwanted position of being inside the relegation zone, with only nine matches remaining in the Championship. Andre Breitenreiter’s side are sitting just one point below the dotted line but Birmingham City above them have a game in hand.
Breitenreiter was named as the permanent successor for Darren Moore back in February and managed to come away with a massive three points in his debut in an English dugout at Vicarage Road against fellow strugglers Watford.
However, two defeats and a draw since then have forced the Yorkshire side to slip inside the bottom three as a result of Stoke City’s late away victory at Deepdale over Preston North End on Saturday afternoon.
With the window closed since the beginning of the previous month, Breitenreiter is now left to work with the squad he inherited from Moore. In January, Huddersfield Town strengthened both their attack and defence, signing Rhys Healey, Radinio Balker and Bojan Radulovic on permanent transfers while acquiring Chelsea youngster Alex Matos on loan.
Amid criticism of the side’s winter arrivals, Nagle took to X, formerly known as Twitter, to defend sporting director Cartwright while also admitting that fans have “not seen the fruits of some of the players” [quotes via Yorkshire Live]:
“Mark [Cartwright] did everything that I asked him to do and then some. He went out and he found the players that we needed, the positions of the players that we needed.
“Did we get the best player there? That’s a tough one, because sometimes if you’re a Premier League player, they want a lot of money for them, and it just doesn’t make sense, because you candidly don’t know if they’re going to work out or not. We might be seeing that right now,” he continued.
“We’ve not seen the fruits of some of the players, mostly because they’ve just not played. We’re seeing Brodie Spencer play really well, I think that Alex Matos, we’ll see. I’m going to guess, I don’t know for sure, this is obviously up to Andre (Breitenreiter), I think we’ll see him back starting in the next match. The reality of it is, those are impact players.”
Writer’s View
In defence of Cartwright, it’s unimaginably tough for players to move to a new club mid-season, having the weight of a possible relegation hanging over their shoulders while also being introduced to a new head coach within just a few weeks of joining.
Nevertheless, there is still time for these players to hit form. Given Huddersfield Town have one of the easiest run-ins in the relegation battle, including a massive game away at Rotherham United on Saturday, Opta have revealed that Breitenreiter’s men have a 68.8% chance of staying in the division which is promising.
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