Wells scores on first start of the season
- Wells delighted to be scoring again- Striker believes partnership with Kachunga could flourish
- He believes Wagner's tactics worked wonders
Nahki Wells was delighted to be back playing and on the scoresheet for Huddersfield Town after returning from injury.
The striker missed a lot of pre-season due to a problem with his knee and he couldn’t have imaged a better game to return in.
“I couldn’t ask for anymore, to be selected to be able to score in a match like them was fantastic.
“We got a fantastic result against a big Club. It was a massive upset and that’s what we came here for.
“It gives you so much confidence when you score. I’ve been playing catch up with fitness after missing the majority of pre-season and you know I got more minutes than I expected today.
“I did better than I expected but there are certain areas that I wasn’t happy with but the goal was good for me and it gives me a platform to kick on from here.”
The Town players played in front of 50,000 people including a sold out away end and it was one of Nahki’s ambitions to play at grounds like St James’ Park.
“It’s a dream to be playing at places like this from where I have come from but we came here and a lot of people had written us off.
“The Head Coach told us to believe, dream, work hard and stick to the plan. We did that and to come out with a result like that is a major boost going into what is a tough run for us.
“The away fans have been fantastic. They’re always really good, our travelling supporters deserve a big credit and I’m really pleased for them because they travelled all this way in their numbers and we came and got a result so I’m sure it will be a great weekend for Town fans.”
It was the first time Wells has played alongside new signing Elias Kachunga who is competing with him for a space in the starting line-up. The two played upfront this afternoon in a different system to what Head Coach David Wagner normally uses.
“He (David Wagner) said he wanted two striker to nullify the midfielders dropping in and I sort of knew the way the Head Coach works and once he said that I knew he was playing another striker.
“It wasn’t easy, it was still hard for me to adapt as I haven’t played with another striker for over a year so it’s hard to adapt and work with him in areas which is a bit foreign to me.
“I just tried to give it my all. This partnership could flourish, we won’t play together all the time but when we do we will work hard and do well for the team.”
During the match Town employed a different style of play which meant either Wells or Kachunga dropped in deep to shut down the midfielders and didn’t press Newcastle until they got into the Huddersfield Town half.
Wells thought this tactic was vital in nullifying Newcastle’s threat.
“We usually press higher but we knew how they wanted to play and if we pressed higher we would encourage them to play the ball over the top and that’s what they wanted to do. Dwight Gayle is a top striker and they wanted to get him in behind.
“We tried to nullify their strengths, stop them from doing what they wanted to do, kept good shape and caused them problems.
“They were knocking it around the back to no harm and when we won it back we wanted to attack them on the break and it showed in our second goal we were able to do that.
“Credit to Jack it was a fantastic finish when he came on. He got what he deserved.”
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