It is a quirk of history that the season in which one of English football’s greatest managers, Brian Clough, won his first major trophy also heralded the start of the long and graceless fall of a club that had been home to two of the game’s other most inspiring leaders, Herbert Chapman and Bill Shankly. While Clough was celebrating turning Derby County into English champions in 1971-72, Huddersfield Town, the first club to win that title three years on the trot, finished bottom of the old First Division. They have been exiled from the top flight ever since.

But something else happened that season, an event the significance of which could not have been foreseen. In a small town south-east of Mainz, a child was born to an American father and a German mother. He grew up to become a footballer and then a manager, and now David Wagner could be about to guide Huddersfield back to where they once belonged. Let us not trumpet Wagner as a new Chapman or Shankly, especially after Friday’s thrashing at Bristol City, but we can certainly say that this manager has produced a thrilling team and aroused new hope in the West Yorkshire town.

A club that had not finished in the top half since clambering back up to Championship five years ago remain well placed in the play-off positions despite their uncharacteristically limp performance at Ashton Gate, which damaged their chances of reaching the Premier League automatically. There remains a vibrant communion between Wagner’s young team and the fans who fill the John Smith’s Stadium for every home match, helping to generate one of the best atmospheres in the land even if the capacity is under 24,000.

Praise must go firstly to the club’s chairman, Dean Hoyle, who has operated shrewdly since taking over nearly a decade ago, never more so than when he took the radical decision to appoint Wagner 16 months ago. At that time Huddersfield were fighting against relegation back to League One and Wagner was in charge of the reserves at Borussia Dortmund, whose senior team were led by his friend and former team-mate Jürgen Klopp. Since then Huddersfield have been transformed with relatively little financial expenditure but a whole lot of energy and intelligence.

No club in the Championship has used fewer players than Huddersfield this season, so it is good that one of the ways in which Wagner has shown himself to have been a smart hire has been to recruit smartly himself. The five players he lured from Germany have all made impacts, including the top scorer, Elias Kachunga, and the centre-back Chris Schindler, who was signed from 1860 Munich for £1.8m, a record fee for the Terriers but a piffling sum compared with those splurged by most rivals. The artful Australia midfielder Aaron Mooy has proved an excellent loan acquisition from Manchester City while Izzy Brown has flourished so much since joining on loan from Chelsea that he was called up this week by England Under-21s.

Wagner took the squad on a pre-season survivalist camp to Sweden to help fuse a medley of diverse players into a dynamic unit. “It was really important to make this trip because the new foreign players spoke from the first day with the English lads and everyone got to know everyone,” says Kachunga. “A team spirit was created.”

Elias Kachunga, left, battles for the ball with Mile Jedinak during Huddersfield’s victory over Aston Villa in March. Photograph: Neville Williams/Aston Villa FC via Getty Images

The exhilarating style that Wagner has introduced would not be possible without that spirit, nor without the rigorous fitness and recovery regime imposed by the manager, who earned a degree in biology and sports science before taking up coaching. That spirit is also one of the reasons why Huddersfield prevail so often in tight contests: 20 of their 22 league wins this season have been by a single goal.

One criticism is that Huddersfield should score more goals, given how often they overwhelm opponents. And they do overwhelm most foes, forcing sides to cling on so as not to get blown away in a whirl of mischievous movement and passing. “Huddersfield are tough,” said Jonjo Shelvey this week when the Newcastle midfielder was asked to name the hardest opposition faced this season. “The way they pass the ball, you just have to stay in the game.”

Even if they do not translate pressure into goals as often as they might, Huddersfield’s vibrancy at least tends to keep opponents from harming them, which is why they have had far fewer shots against them than any other team in the league.

Wagner has given his team a clear identity without being dogmatic. He can adapt. Huddersfield add long passing to their repertoire when teams try to sabotage more intricate moves. Earlier in the campaign they had a problem with conceding from set pieces but they have fixed that and, what is more, have become more dangerous themselves from dead-ball plays, Tommy Smith’s winning goal from a nifty corner routine at Aston Villa being one of several recent examples.

Wagner’s substitutions usually demonstrate his ability to think on his feet. He also plans meticulously, tweaking his lineup depending on opponents. Kachunga may have struck only 10 league goals this season but that is partially because his position, like those of other forwards, varies – and even when not scoring he is dangerous.

“For me the versatility is good,” says Kachunga. “We have a lot of good lads up front so in the game sometimes I can go forward in the middle or outside on the wing and that makes it hard for the opponent to know which position a player is going to appear in. That helps makes us strong. Before every match the manager gives us the right tactics and that means we go on to the pitch with everyone knowing what he has to do. We have seen that most of the time he is right.”

Wagner, clever as well as charismatic, has earned trust. When the team hit a bump in October, losing 5-0 to Fulham in their only performance as bad as Friday’s one at Bristol City, it signalled the start of a run of five matches without a win and ignited suspicions that their early pace-setting had faded for good. But disenchantment got no hold then on Huddersfield and it should not do so now. “It’s normal for a young team to have a few weeks when not everything happens the way you want but we also have some older players with a lot of experience and they and the manager knew what to say [in October],” says Kachunga. “The team came back stronger. We are a young team hungry for wins and we hope this story will have a brilliant end.”