Huddersfield Town midfielder David Kasumu reveals N'Golo Kante inspiration

The Huddersfield Town midfield enforcer is from Lambeth, a Chelsea stronghold in South London.

In his particular position, the Blues arguably possess the best of his type in the world, let alone the country.

It is a shame for many neutrals that France's N'Golo Kante is not patrolling the middle ground with authority at the World Cup in Qatar, although devout fans of leading nations including England will not be particularly bemoaning his absence, given what he brings to Les Blues' star-studded line-up.

English he may be, but the studious side of Kasumu, rated as the 'best ball recoverer in the Championship' recently by Terriers head coach Mark Fotheringham, will lament the fact that Kante is not around due to a deep-seated hamstring injury.

He's taken a few notes in his time.

Kasumu said: "In recent years, the influence for me has been N'Golo Kante and obviously with him being at Chelsea, I have watched him a lot in terms of his energy, fight and drive and his qualities are things that I enjoy doing out on the pitch.

"He is a leader out on the pitch and someone you can count on.

"For me, I am always trying to watch and see how people play in my position and here as well (at Huddersfield), I am always watching all my clips and speaking to the manager and his staff in terms of what I can be doing better.

"There's still a lot of learning for me.

"After every game, we get our running stats and things and I check all the statistics and stuff every day - my personal ones but the teams.

"I do look at my ground duels and things like that."

Kasumu's combative qualities are likely to be leaned upon a fair bit when Huddersfield's season resumes after the World Cup break in a Yorkshire derby at Sheffield United on December 10.

More especially given Town's situation at the bottom of the table. They are three points adrift of second-from-bottom Blackpool, although they do have a game on the Seasiders and their fellow Lancastrians Wigan, who are also in the relegation zone.

Few Terriers followers are viewing the current campaign as anything other than a relegation scrap - the club's third in four seasons at this level.

The 22-year-old has previous experience of survival fight at former club MK Dons, who found themselves in a battle at the wrong end of League One in 2019-20.

On Huddersfield's parlous predicament, Kasumu, pictured, continued: "Of course, it hurts.

"With the team we have got, we should not be in that position.

"But there's still plenty of games and there's a lot of time to turn things around and we can do it, sooner rather than later.

"It takes every sort of player and every single staff member and everyone has to be on the same boat and on the same page.

"It's a fight and everyone has to work as hard as they can to win the fight."