Yorkshire bragging rights will be on the line at Oakwell tomorrow.

Huddersfield Town head coach Michael Duff says he is focused on what his side “need to still improve on” in order to meet the “huge expectations” of those associated with the club.

The Terriers are tasked with getting their League One promotion bid back on track following a run of five matches without a victory, which has left Town sixth in the table and two points inside the play-offs heading into tomorrow afternoon’s Yorkshire derby against Barnsley at Oakwell.

Huddersfield Town head coach Michael Duff says he is focused on what his side “need to still improve on” in order to meet the “huge expectations” of those associated with the club.

The Terriers are tasked with getting their League One promotion bid back on track following a run of five matches without a victory, which has left Town sixth in the table and two points inside the play-offs heading into tomorrow afternoon’s Yorkshire derby against Barnsley at Oakwell.

Following a 1-0 win at promotion rivals Wycombe Wanderers in early January, Town had moved to within four points of the top two with a game in hand, but the Terriers now sit 10 points adrift of the automatic promotion spots following their recent results.

“There’s loads of work to be done, there’s been good work that’s gone on. Football doesn’t go in a straight line, and a rebuild doesn’t happen in a couple of months,” Duff said.

“It’s just focusing on what we need to still improve on, which there are lots of things we still need to improve on, because I think I’m at a football club now where there are huge expectations, rightly so, because we’re a big football club, but having expectation and the reality of where you’re actually at are sometimes two different things.

“We just need to keep chipping away, and getting back to whether it’s digging results out, or playing more free-flowing football probably, faster football, rather than a bit too slow at times, which has been a fault of ours, to go and get more wins.

 

“With the players that we’ve got, we should be up in and around it. I think the shift in expectation is we have a really tricky start of the season, with lots of things going on, but you get to within four points of the top two with a game in hand, you sign two centre-forwards and everyone thinks ‘that’s it then, you’re done, you’ll win 4-0 every week and get promoted’, football doesn’t work like that. Sometimes players have to deal with expectation, and some players can and some players can’t, and that’s at every football club.

“Our players need to be able to handle 20,000 fans demanding, and an owner that’s demanding. It’s part of the job, because otherwise, go and play non-league football in front of 400 people. No-one wants to do that, they want to play at the top level, but again reality and expectation sometimes are two different things.”

Town have registered 49 points from 29 matches played, while tomorrow’s opponents sit tenth in the table, six points behind the Terriers having played a game more.

The Tykes have picked up just one point from their last five league matches, and previewing the encounter against his former club, Duff said: “I think we’re both on dicky runs, we’ve both gone five without a win I think it is.

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