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Martin Drury makes it clear what he now needs from Huddersfield Town players Town had 54 per cent possession against their Championship opponents at the weekend Huddersfield Town head coach is looking for his side to have “more control with the ball” off the back of Saturday’s Carabao Cup exit against Preston North End. The Terriers were knocked out of the competition at the first-round stage with a 4-3 penalty shootout defeat to the Lilywhites, following a 1-1 draw at Goodison Park. Town had 54 per cent possession against their Championship opponents at the weekend, who had Lewis Gibson sent off in the 21st minute, and Drury told HTTV: “I think if you look at the context of the game, and if I’m honest the context of games across pre-season, I’d like us to have more control with the ball. “I understand that people want to see us playing forwards, running forwards, but I felt that at times when we do that, we risk the ball. “Other times, we did it really well, we arrived in the final third, and I didn’t think our end product was good enough in the final third. “We’ve had 23 touches in their box, I didn’t think the quality was quite there when we arrived there, but it’s the first game of the season, we’re coming off the back of pre-season, so we’re not quite there fully up to speed on that, but that’s certainly a part of the game, the final third and taking control of games, having more control of games, is something that I want us to do better.” Drury was pleased with the way his side controlled Saturday’s contest following the opening ten minutes until half-time, but felt they were unable to replicate that in the second half. Reflecting on the encounter, the head coach said: “First half, I thought Preston started quite well. They played really direct in the first five minutes, which we knew they were going to be. “We spoke about it all week, it’s the work we’ve done all week, and dealing with direct play, dealing with balls in the box, dealing with set plays, so they started really well. “I thought it took us five or ten minutes to settle into the game, and then I thought once we did, we started to find the right solutions in those moments, and with the ball as well, and first half I thought we were very good, albeit Preston had a man sent off. “It came from a picture that we’d looked at in training, and the players had executed really, really well, so we end up putting their player in a position where he’s got to make a decision, whether he lets Fletch (Ashley Fletcher) run through on goal or whether he pulls him back, and obviously that led to the sending off. “From that sending off, I felt that we put the foot down again up until half-time. I thought we created chances, we arrived in the final third, we had complete control. “We were making them run, we were making them tired by the things we were doing first half, switching the play really, really quickly, getting down the sides. I would have liked a little bit more quality in the final third from us, but I thought at the half-time period, we were in a really good place. “We spoke about the second half, we spoke at half-time about a game from last season that was reminiscent of the scenario that we were in, and we spoke about the things that we needed to do second half. I felt we did them in moments, but not consistent enough, and ultimately you go to 94 minutes and the one time that they arrive in the box and they get a shot away, you end up drawing the game from a position that you were in real control of at half-time.”