'Football is brutal' - Hogg expects unselected players to keep training 'properly'
Chris Hogg expects the senior members of his squad who have not had much game-time recently to stay professional, keep training hard and continue to give him selection headaches.
Hogg has a fairly large squad at his disposal and as such he’s having to consistently leave several senior players out of his matchday 18. The likes of Conor McCarthy and Kamarai Swyer have barely featured at all this season, while Harvey Saunders, Logan Briggs and Sam Chambers have been victims of the team’s improved recent form.
Saunders was involved in six of Town’s first seven league games but hasn’t even featured in a matchday since the international break, while Briggs’ return to the bench against Colchester on Saturday was the first time he’s made the 18 since the EFL Trophy tie against Cambridge, although he remained an unused substitute. Leeds United loanee Sam Chambers is another player who’s been in and out of the squad.
“It’s been fine,” said Hogg when asked how he’s been able to manage his squad. “That’s just part and parcel of the game and part and parcel of sport. It’s a competitive sport and people can sometimes forget that, both inside football clubs and outside.
“We’re here to compete, we’re here to win and we’re here to do the best we can, on and off the pitch. That’s part of the reason I do the job - that fulfilment you get from help individuals get to where they want to get to in their careers.
“The reality is that football is a hard world and a brutal world. The players have been good and they’ve responded well and they’ve trained properly and added to the culture on the training ground. There’s healthy competition in the squad, that’s for sure.
“I love working with the group because of their enthusiasm and how they want to learn and get better and I think you’re starting to see that on the pitch in the last few results and performances.”