Birmingham City reaction given to Alfie May's Huddersfield Town struggle - "I'm surprised Lee Grant has still got a job" | OneFootball

Huddersfield Town paid Birmingham City £1.2 million for Alfie May during the summer, but FLW's fan pundit feels they're not using him correctly.

One of Huddersfield Town's big summer signings is misfiring, but FLW's Birmingham City fan pundit feels that they're not making the most of him.

£1.2 million is a lot of money for a League One club to spend on a player, so when Alfie May made the switch from Birmingham City to Huddersfield Town during the summer there was always going to be pressure on him to perform.

May is a highly experienced striker who's scored goals throughout his career, but this hasn't happened so far at The Accu Stadium. He's featured in all 13 of their League matches so far this season, but the goals have not been flowing, with just two scored.

With the new Huddersfield boss Lee Grant already under huge pressure over his team's tepid start to the new season, the manager's windows of opportunity to keep himself in his first managerial position are starting to close all around him, and his handling of the former Birmingham City striker is providing plenty of ammunition for the idea that this may be a role for which he's not cut out.

Huddersfield Town rebuked over Alfie May's failure in front of goal since summer transfer

With all of this in mind, Football League World have spoken to our Birmingham City fan pundit Jason Moore to get his assessment of what's going wrong for May at Huddersfield, and Jason is surprised at what he's seen: "£1.2 million for Alfie May at his age, making money on him, was a fantastic deal. I'm very, very surprised at how poorly he's doing but to be fair I don't think he's being given his fair share of games at Huddersfield and I don't think Huddersfield are playing to his strengths, from what I've seen. He's someone who gets goals! Play to his strengths!"

Having seen plenty of May when he was at St Andrew's, Jason has few doubts that the striker can score goals for them, but he's critical of Huddersfield for playing him out of position: "The thing with Alfie May is that once he gets a couple he'll absolutely start flying. He's proved it already in that league. But from what I've seen of Huddersfield, they're not playing to his strengths. They're not really playing him in position. It's pretty poor."

But of course, what's going wrong for a former player at another club isn't Jason's main concern, and he is at least happy with the deal that Birmingham got to move him on, despite his surprise at what he considers to be the misuse of May: "I'm surprised Lee Grant has still got a job, to be fair, for the job he's doing at Huddersfield. Alfie May should be your number nine. Just play to his strengths and he'll get you out of that league, simple as. He scored a decent amount of goals for us and he was barely playing, so I'm very surprised. But you know what? Take the profit. It was a very good sale by us in the end, I guess."

Alfie May is a proven League One goalscorer

Having turned 30 years of age a couple of weeks before his transfer from Birmingham City to Huddersfield Town in July, there's no doubting Alfie May's experience. The striker made the step up from the non-league game to the EFL in January 2017 when he signed for Doncaster Rovers, but it was at his next club, Cheltenham Town, where he made his reputation, scoring 43 league goals in two seasons before moving on to Charlton Athletic, where he completed a hat-trick of scoring more than twenty goals in a season by netting 23 times.

This attracted the interest of Birmingham City, and in July 2024 they made their move and took him to St Andrews. He was only with Birmingham for one season, but what a season it was. May scored 16 times in 44 league appearances for the Blues as they raced to a record-breaking 111 points and the League One title.

But Birmingham are nothing if not ambitious, and with the club pursuing a second successive promotion to the Premier League, it was decided that May should be moved on, with Huddersfield paying £1.2 million for him. So far, though, this transfer has not turned out as neither the player nor his new club would have hoped. He's managed two goals in the League for them, but both of these came in August, and his team have only won two of the seven League games they've played since the end of that month.

May is a proven goalscorer in League One, as demonstrated by his record at Cheltenham, Charlton and Birmingham, and the suggestion that Grant is simply not making the most of him will sting, at Huddersfield. If Lee Grant is to survive in this position much longer, he needs to find an answer to this question and quickly. If he can't, it's more likely than not that this summer signing will end up outlasting his manager at The Accu Stadium.