Michael Beale faced the media today ahead of Sunderland’s trip to Huddersfield Town in the Sky Bet Championship.
Here’s the key talking points from today’s press conference…
On Huddersfield Town…
Huddersfield are a very interesting team – they’ve scored seven goals in their last two games and only lost one in five.
They’re fighting for their lives and waiting for a new coach to go in. Like ourselves, every game is so important for them.
It will be a really tough game, they’re quite direct and they play a lot of forward passes. We will need to be defensively strong.
On injures…
Corry Evans is back on the grass now, but he’ll do a couple of days with the Under-21s to phase him back in.
Callum Styles has re-joined the group – the game on Wednesday will be too early for him, but he might be in contention for the weekend.
Elliot Embleton rolled his ankle in training, so he’ll miss a couple of days.
On Chris Rigg…
Riggy’s mentality is his biggest strength – he’s a boy from this part of the world and it means a lot to him.
I put him on at the weekend because I wanted us to win more duels in midfield, it was a crucial moment in the game.
He has a fearless mentality and that’s a huge asset.
On the Championship…
Every team has different strengths – some teams are very good at set pieces, and they can be dominated between both boxes, but when they get their moments, they take them. We need to be wary of teams like that.
Our job is to find a way to beat everyone – we’re willing to take risks and keep people up the pitch and capitalise on turnovers.