EFL Championship 2021/22: How Luton Town and Huddersfield stopped each other with similar tactics – tactical analysis

The 2021-22 EFL Championship’s regular season is done and dusted with Fulham and Bournemouth achieving a direct promotion to the 2022-23 Premier League season. For the third spot, four other teams are competing with Luton Town and Huddersfield playing in one of the semi-finals. 

After finding themselves in League Two exactly five years back, Luton Town now have the opportunity to realise their dream of playing in the top tier of English football and arguably the most popular football league in the world after 30 years. Meanwhile, Huddersfield are hoping to make a comeback to the Premier League after a gap of three years. 

Both teams contested the first leg looking to win and both managers seem to have deployed the same tactics that saw both of them being neutralised with a 1-1 draw in the end.

This tactical analysis features the tactics deployed by both sides that resulted in a draw in the end. Let’s begin the analysis.

Lineups

Luton Town made no changes to the lineup that beat Reading 1-0 in their final game of the season and Carlos Corberan insisted on the same lineup and his preferred playing eleven with the squad that he has.

Huddersfield, on the other hand, made two changes to the lineup that beat Bristol City 2-0 in their final league game of the season where Tom Lees came into the lineup for Pipa and Lewis O’Brien replaced Jon Russell. 

Similar formations with slight differences

Both managers have been using a three at the back system and its variants for a better part of the season. Depending on the opposition there would be a slight variation in terms of the number of players in the midfield or the attack with 3-4-3 and 3-5-2 constantly being changed here and there, especially from Huddersfield.