[Lord Snooty]

November 10:

Get sat comfortably. there's a lot to get through today......

Yesterday, we had the defeat at Accrington in the FA Cup. We only had to wait four years and a day for our revenge. It didn't look that way in the first half though, as the two teams met again on this date in 2007.

It was a terrible start to the game. We were stood on the open terrace and the game was so bad that we turned around and started to watch the game being played on the nearby playing fields. 

Stanley were 2-0 up after 25 minutes, but right on the stroke of half time, with the Town fans getting prepared for an enormous BOOOOO, Malvin Kamara pulled a goal back.

The Stanners, who had current Wigan boss Leam Richardson in their side, were getting destroyed after the break. Marvellous Malvin was ripping them to pieces and it was he who levelled the scores up in the 83rd minute. And then in the 89th minute, all the pressure paid off when substitute Luke Beckett scored the winner.

The game on the playing fields? No idea. The second half of the Town match was much more interesting.

And when the draw was made, we got a home tie for the 2nd round. Grimsby Town.

Now there's an embarrassing stat that comes out every time we play away at Preston North End. And that is that we haven't won a game at Deepdale since the 69/70 season. Well today's the day, for on this date in 1969, Huddersfield Town, under the leadership of Ian Greaves, won 3-1 away at PNE.

It was a Monday night match, following a long away trip down to Norwich on the Saturday, which we won 2-1. The win at Preston was won with two goals from Frank Worthington and one from Jimmy Lawson.

On this date in 1928, we hammered Burnley 7-1 at Leeds Road. Not quite a record, as we'd beaten Birmingham 7-0 in 1913 and Cardiff 8-2 in the season before this game.

Alex Jackson, the famous Scottish winger who scored a hat trick against England, scored another hat trick in this one in front of a 12,645 crowd. Bob Kelly got one against his old club, Wilf Lewis got two and Laurie Cumming got the other.

Lewis was a Welsh international striker, who played one game for them against England whilst a Town player. More of that later this month. Cumming was an Irish international, who got two caps when he was at Huddersfield.

Of course, Kelly was a famous England international, so all the scorers for Town were representative of the entire British Isles. Don't want to get political, but is it United Kingdom? Great Britain? I don't know. Cumming was from Derry. Or is it Londonderry.

Oh no. Let's close that can of worms.

Here's a picture of Bob in his England kit.....

Now then. Six years after that win over Burnley, we did go and beat it. We had an 8-0 win on this date in 1934. But we'd had a 10-1 win against Blackpool in 1930 so this 8-0 win was no kind of record at all. 

It was however, our record victory over Liverpool. Yes kids. Liverpool. I'll say it again. Huddersfield Town 8 (eight), Liverpool 0.

It was at the time, Liverpool's record defeat and it's only been slightly bettered once since. That was in the fifties when they lost a 2nd Division game 9-1 at Birmingham City. So still an eight goal deficit. I'd like to think it's still a record. Well it is, isn't it. Of course it is. It's Liverpool's biggest defeat in the top flight of English football. Oh yes.

Now how this freak result came about, I don't know. Town, under the leadership of Clem Stephenson, were struggling in the league at the time and were actually bottom of the First Division at kick off time. We'd lost 5-0 at Portsmouth the week before and had only won three games all season.

Liverpool were no mugs. they finished the season in 7th, while we finished in 16th. So what was this all about? Don't know!

Town were 4-0 up at half time and it could've been more after we'd had one cleared off the line, one hit the crossbar and Albert Malam missed an open goal. It was Jimmy Richardson who scored the first after 18 minutes, in front of another disappointing crowd of just 12,512. Malam made it 2-0 and Alf Lythgoe made it 3-0, before Malam made it 4-0 just before the break from a twice taken penalty, after the Reds' keepr, Arthur Riley was adjudged to have moved off his line.

Malam, playing on the left wing, was born in Liverpool and was tearing their defence to shreds in one of only 21 games he played for Town before moving to Doncaster Rovers. He set up goals for Charlie Luke and Wilf Bott to make it 6-0. It was he himself though who got the seventh, to complete his hat trick, with Richardson, the ex Newcastle striker completeing the rout with the 8th.

And I've not even mentioned the Milk Cup yet. What a day this is!

On this date in 1982, little 3rd Division Huddersfield Town, with the magical Mick Buxton as manager, went to Bellend Road to play Second Division Leeds United in a League Cup 3rd round match. They'd just been relegated after being the team of the 70s that everybody hated under Don Revie.

They were a pale shadow of that side now and had one of our old stars playing for them. Yes, that's Frank Worthington on the cover of the programme.

We were playing brilliantly at this time and would gain automatic promotion at the end of the season and play against this lot in the league. We were on an unbeaten run as well, and had won the last five league games. We won this one as well. Of course we did. It's one of the highlights of my time watching Town. I'd been living in Batley throughout the 70s and went to a school full of Leeds fans. This win meant more than anything in the world that night.

We absolutely mullered them and to say we only just scraped home 1-0, it was a much bigger win than that. The goal itself was quite a simple one in the end. Brian Cox in goal kicked it out to Mark Lillis, who sped down the wing, crossed it to the far post where David Cowling met it with his head. I think, his only headed goal for us.

Absolute pandemonium in the crammed little portion of the ground they'd fenced us in. It was a 24,215 attendance, but there must have been at least 4,000 of us squeezed in to that pen. What a dump that ground was, by the way.

So after dodging all the bricks being lobbed into our little pen from the demolition site outside at the final whistle, we drew Arsenal away in the next round. Bring it on.

We have some international matches today as well. Ron Staniforth played for England in a Home Internationals game against Wales at Wembley on this date in 1954. Future Town keeper, Ray Wood played in this one as well. England won it 3-2.

And on this date in 1965, England played Northern Ireland at Wembley. Ray Wilson was in the England line up. He was an Everton player by now though. There was one Town player in the game though. That was Jimmy Nciholson, lining up alongside the likes of George Best, Derek Dougan and Pat Jennings for Norn Iron.

England of course would go on to win the World Cup in the following summer. They won this match as well, 2-1 with goals from Joe Baker and Alan Peacock, with Willie Irvine scoring for Jimmy Nick's team.

Finally.......

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

On this date in 1917, a year and a day before the armistice, ex Huddersfield Town player Ernest Kenworthy was killed by a shell on the Western Front.

He was born in Matlock in 1887 and played inside right in the Football League for Bradford City, before joining Town in 1909, in our Midland League season. He made his debut in the third game of that campaign, away at Rotherham Town and played 14 times in the league, scoring three goals, against The Wednesday, Bradford Park Avenue and Worksop Town.

He also played in all the FA Cup matches that season, including the record victory 11-0 against Heckmondwike, scoring twice. And also the infamous match against South Kirkby Colliery that I wrote about the other day.

His final game was against Gainsborough Trinity in January 1910, before retiring from the game to take up the teaching profession. By 1914, he was Headmaster back in Matlock, of the town school.

Despite this important position in his home town, he enlisted in the Army at the outbreak of the war and served as a gunner in the Royal Garrison Artillery.

He was killed on this date in 1917 and is buried in Coxyde Military Cemetery, Belgium. He was 29 and left a widow and a child.

[Lord Snooty]

November 11:

Well after so much going on yesterday, there's hardly anything to talk abouit today. We haven't played much recently on this date and we haven't had a win since 1933. Plenty of draws and a win during the war, but no proper win since then.

It was a home match with Sheffield Wednesday in the season when we finished as runners up to Arsenal. There was a crowd of 19,894 there for this one. It finished as a 3-2 win for the Town. Bradford Park Avenue legend, George McLean scored twice and Dave Mangnall got the other and the win had us still in third place at full time.

And that's about it for things of interest for today, so seeing as it's Armistice Day, here's the Huddersfield Town AFC Roll of Honour.........



Larrett Roebuck 1889 - 18th October 1914.

Henry Crozier 1888 - 1st July 1916.

Charles Randall 1884 - 27th September 1916.

Leigh Richmond Roose 1877 - 7th October 1916.

Sidney James 1891 - 9th April 1917.

Ernest Kenworthy 1888 - 10th November 1917.

Edward Didymus 1886 - 12th April 1918.

Robert Gordon 1917 - 18th September 1940.

Frank Chivers 1909 - 2nd April 1942.

Thomas Carter 1923 - 28th April 1943.

David Bell 1922 - 21st May 1944.

Edwin Watson 1914 - 12th June 1944.

Ralph Shields 1892 - 21st November 1944.

Alex Jackson 1905 - 15th November 1946.

[Lord Snooty]

November 12:

Huddersfield Town reached the Final of the FA Youth Cup in 1973/74, but lost 2-1 on aggregate to Tottenham Hotspur. The tradition at the time was for the finalists to each host a team of England Youth hopefuls and on this date in 1974, Town's Juniors did face the England Youth XI at Leeds Road.

The England team had two players who did indeed go on to have stellar careers both at club level and international. Ray Wilkins of Chelsea, also known as Butch and so called in the programme team line ups, was one of them. Bryan Robson of West Bromwich Albion was the other. Wilkins went on to gain 84 England caps and Robson got 90.

Also in the England team were Dick Taylor and Paul Bielby. Taylor was the Town keeper who had played in that Youth Cup Final. He went on to play for England at Youth level on a couple of occasions, before getting into the Town first team. He played over a hundred times for the Terriers, before a back injury wrecked his career, causing him to retire at the age of 25.

Bielby was at Man Utd, playing 4 games in their first team. But we signed him from Hartlepool in 1978 and he wasn't all that good sadly.

Lining up for the Town that night, LLoyd Maitland the first black player to play for us, Peter Hart, the future Town skipper and Vicar of Walsall and Steve Spriggs who at four foot eleven and a half inches tall, was the smallest player to play in the Football League. He only played in four games for Town, but went on to become Cambridge United's record appearances holder with 416. Size isn't everything, you know.

So who won the match? Absolutely no idea. Answers on a postcard to the usual address please. 

On this date in 1927, we had our record away win, a win that still stands today. It was a 7-1 win against Sheffield United. It has since been equaled by 6-0 wins at Bury and Stockport. This huge victory came just six weeks after we'd beaten Cardiff 8-2 at home, in the season where we finished as runners up to Everton.

Jack Chaplin was the Town manager and the scoring was opened for Town by Tommy Meads. This was one of only two goals he scored for us before transferring to Reading and later on, he played around 200 games for Spurs, before finishing at Notts County. The other scorers were more familiar names with Billy Smith, George Brown and Alex Jackson all getting two each.

Despite those two big wins, we were still only 13th in the table, but of course, we had a better second half to the season.

On this date in 1994, Neil Warnock took his Town side to play Doncaster Rovers at Belle Vue in the first round of the FA Cup. Town were top of the Third Division, despite last week's loss at York City. Donny were struggling, with a knobhead chairman who soon after this game, set fire to the stand after the council refused to build him a new stadium.

We won this one 4-1 with four legends of the 90s on the score sheet. Darren Bullock, Andy Booth, Ronnie Jepson and Iain Dunn got the goals.

Hopeful of a good Cup run this season, we disappointingly went out at Lincoln City in the next round.

[Lord Snooty]

That England Youth game finished 2-2. Bob Mountain and David Nicholls scored for Town. It's mentioned in today's match programme but no mention of the England scorers.

[Lord Snooty]

November 13:

On this date in 1954, Town were 6th in the First Division and went down to London to play the Arsenal at Highbury. We had finished the previous season in 3rd place and were in contention again for a crack at the title. Andy Beattie was still the manager and we had lost just once in the last nine games prior to this trip to the capital.

Arsenal's manager was Tom Whittaker and he was part of the regime that built up a fierce rivalry with Huddersfield Town in the 20s and 30s. He played his whole career with the Gunners, which was cut short by a broken knee cap. He became assistant to Herbert Chapman and stayed with the club after Chapman's death in 1934. He then became a Squadron Leader in the RAF during the war, receiving the MBE for his work on D-Day. Under his management, Arsenal had won the league twice and the FA Cup once.

So when a crowd of 42,950 came out to see this one, many would still have memories of the rivalry between the two clubs. Most of them went home disappointed as Town won a high scoring match 5-3. I've looked all over the place for the Arsenal scorers, but can't find owt. I know ours though.

Bill McGarry, who had played for England in the World Cup in the summer got the first. Former Motherwell striker, Jimmy Watson got the second. The other three came from the dynamic duo, Jimmy Glazzard and Vic Metcalfe, with Gentleman Jim scoring twice.

The win took us up to 4th in the table, but a mid season slump meant we ended up in a disappointing 12th.

The season after that though, we got relegated and didn't get back up again until 69/70. In our second season back up, we struggled and eventually got relegated. We were doing reasonably though when on this date in 1971, West Ham United came to Leeds Road.

The Hammers came back later in the season and famously got stuffed by the Terriers in the FA Cup and we beat them in this one as well. Dave Smith was the scorer in a 1-0 win. He also scored in the Cup match. Those two were two of only four he scored in the season.

Can't find any pictures of him on t'internet, only Steve Smith comes up when you type in his name and Huddersfield Town 1971. Here's a picture of manager Ian Greaves, on the blower to Google telling them to get their bloody act together.

Dave and Steve were a couple of Smiths in the 71/72 team and over the years we've had 19 Smiths playing for Huddersfield Town, Twenty if you want to count Emile Smith Rowe.

One of those 19 has a birthday today. That's Martin Smith who played 85 times for us between 2000 and 2003. He was born on this date in 1974 and is 48 today. Born in Sunderland, he started out his playing career with his home town club, but when he signed for us, it was from Sheffield United.

He had the dubious task of replacing fans' favourite Marcus Stewart, who had controversially been sold to Ipswich. He did alright, scoring four times in ten games in the back end of the 99/00 season, including both goals in a 2-0 win at home against Wolves.

Sadly, his Town career was ravaged by injury and he never lived up to the mantle of the man to replace Marcus and dropped down the leagues after leaving us, playing for Northampton Town and Darlington.

Here he is in the classic Panasonic away kit, playing against West Brom in 2000.

[HerefordBull]

As it's Remembrance Sunday I thought I'd write a little about one of your ex players who sadly lost their life on the Somme in 1916. You have mentioned him before on the anniversary of his death........Goalkeeper, Leigh Richmond Roose.

I got hold of the book mentioned in the previous write up, Lost In France by Spencer Vignes. It is a good read and apart from my interest in Military History had a lot of football content. This guy was an extraordinary goalkeeper who even got the rules of the game changed due to the way he played! Most keepers of that time stayed on their goal line and were subjected to physical violence by the opposition forwards and at that time received no protection from the referee...............change from the modern game! Roose not only came out of the penalty area and acted as a sweeper but also gave as good as he got with regard to the violence.

I say the penalty area as in his day the goalkeeper was allowed to bounce the ball anywhere in his own half so frequently he would be taking the ball write up to the halfway line before either kicking or throwing it to get an attack going. This is the rule the FA eventually changed restricting goalkeepers to the penalty area. He was a real character chatting to the crowd, doing extraordinary warm up routines ( like John Budge ) and often having made a save would swing himself up onto the crossbar to take the plaudits of the crowd. He also introduced the Bruce Grobbelaar knee tremble whilst waiting for the penalty taker to run up. Certainly a "playboy" of his day both on and off the field!

There are a few mentions of Huddersfield Town in the book mainly about his disputes with the club regarding "breaking of contracts" and "expenses" ( He was always an amateur so was able to claim only expenses for the games.......however this became a grey area as clubs wanted him to play for them and the amount he was claiming was a vast amount which led to on going dispute with the FA.)

The first mention of the Terriers was when recovering from injury he played various invitational events and one of these was for Port Vale against his former Club Stoke City for a Stafforshire trophy. One of the other "ringers" Port Vale got in for the game was Herbert Chapman who I'm sure all Terrier fans know!
Roose played 5 games for the Terriers at the end of the 1910 / 11 season but at the start of the next one he got an offer to play for Aston Villa which he accepted. Huddersfield sent directors down to see him to try and change his mind but after his first appearance for the Villa the Yorkshire club tried to sue Roose for breaking a contract. As Roose pointed out though, he was an amateur and as such didn't have a contract!!

When he had played for Huddersfield, on three occasions , he had stayed with Hilton Crowther, a wealthy cotton trader and a director of the football club. During his playing time they became friends but with the "breach of contract" dispute that rumbled on this relationship soured. In 1912 the Club went into liquidation and Crowther settled all the debts but still refused to pay Roose a penny for his "expenses" which Roose had put a figure of £2000 on!! The dispute rumbled on well into 1914 when eventually it went to Court where due to Roose firstly deciding to defend himself and secondly being absent due to the War lost the case.

The rest is history with Roose ( or Rouse as he was known in the Royal Fusiliers following his return from Gallipoli ......why??) after winning the Military Medal for bravery in August he disappeared, presumed dead, in October near Gueudecourt on the Somme.

RIP

[HerefordBull]

Milton scored twice for Arsenal and Doug Lishman got the other in 1954.

[Lord Snooty]

Yes indeed, that book about LR Roose is a fascinating story. I'd recommend it to any fan of football history.

[Lord Snooty]

November 14:

On this date in 2009, we had the first of our two 6-0 wins against Wycombe Wanderers. it was a League One encounter and they were yo-yoing between Leagues 1 and 2, having just come up, they would go down and back up again before we beat them 6-0 at their place in 2012. Jordan Rhodes of course scored five times in that one. He didn't score at all in this one.

The first goal came from the skipper, Peter Clarke heading in from a whipped in Gary Roberts free kick. The second came from a fantastic, fast paced breakaway (remember them?) from defending a corner, swiftly bowled out by Alex Smithies to Michael Collins, to Anthony Pilkington, to Roberts to tap it into the goal.

That was 2-0 at half time. It was 3-0 after 49 minutes, Pilks smashing the ball home after some good work from young Jordan. Clarkey made it 4-0 from a Robbo corner, winning the header that was blocked on the line. But he was first to the rebound and sent it into the back of the net, through the covering defender's legs.

Substitute Theo Robinson, who came on for Lee Novak at half time, had a couple of chances that went begging. He was just about to tap in from three yards out when Michael Duberry intercepted and stuck it in his own net. Poor Theo could've had a hat trick, but it was looking like he would miss out.

But straight from the kick off, Town won the ball back and set off towards the Wycombe goal in search of another. Dopey Duberry tripped up Roberts in the penalty area, Robbo picked up the ball and placed it on the spot. But being the generous lad he is, he then let young Theo have the chance to make it 6-0. And he took that chance.

Such a popular guy and such was the team spirit of this great side, they all had a mass pile on, even though the game had been won long before.

And we have it on the telly.....

Another game that was on the telly was played on this date in 1999. It was at the City Ground and we beat Nottingham Forest 3-1 in a superb display of football from the terrific Terriers and was the fifth win on the bounce and the fifth in a run of nine wins in ten games.

Sadly I can't find it on YouTube, but I do remember going to the pub to watch it on Sky Sports and Brian Clough was in the expert's chair. An actual bona fide expert on Sky. What a novelty!

Anyway, this was the Clyde Wijnhard show. He opened the scoring, before Kevin Gray headed in the second from a free kick. Alan Rogers pulled one back for the Florist on the stroke of half time. But Clyde sealed the win in the 63rd minute.

Steve Bruce and his Merry Men were now up to third in the table and looking good for at least a crack at the Play Offs. As we all know by now, that didn't happen.

On this date in 1970, we went to Turf Moor and beat Burnley in a First Division match. We'd dropped into the bottom three after last week's defeat at home to Chelsea, but this win took us back up to 17th.

It was a 3-2 win, another that was televised, and here it is, in all it's black and white glory. Bobby Hoy scored twice and Jimmy Lawson got the other.

League title winning manager, Cecil Potter was born on this date in 1888. He had taken over from Herbert Chapman, who had left to join Arsenal and he was the manager who completed our hat trick of Football League titles. I may have mentioned it before but we were the first team to achieve that.

Cecil was born in West Hoathly in Sussex, the son of a Congregational minister, he played for Ipswich Town, Norwich City and Hull City. He then became player/manager of Hartlepools United and later on, manager of Derby County.

After almost getting the Rams to Wembley in the FA Cup and almost getting them promoted to Division One, he was appointed secretary/manager of the double league champions in July 1925, getting paid a handsome salary of £600 per annum.

His one and only season in charge of the Town started well, going unbeaten in the first ten matches and by the time our brave lads went top of the league in February after a win against Everton, we stayed top all the way to the end of the season, becoming thrice champions with a 3-0 win at home to Bolton, with a couple of games to spare.

Sadly, ill health caused him to resign his post shortly after the close of the season and Jack Chaplin took over. Cecil's health improved though and he was back in the game by December, going to manage Norwich. That wasn't succesful though and the Canaries were relegated to Division Three (South) and he resigned.

Jack Cock was born on this date in 1893 in Hayle, Cornwall. He and Fred Bullock played for Town before the First World War and both of them joined the 17th (Service) Battalion, The Middlesex Regiment, also known as the Football Battalion when the war broke out. At the same time, the pair of them guested for Brentford, Jack's old club.

Jack had moved to London with his family at an early age and settled in Fulham. His first job was as a caddie at Burnham Beeches Golf Club, from which he was sacked for playing football with a golf ball on one of the greens. Golf clubs were obviously full of snobs even back then (apologies if you are a golf club snob). So he got a job in a foundry and started playing football for West Kensington Utd. Soon after he was offered a place at Brentford, who were in the Southern League then, from where he joined Huddersfield Town in 1914.

Fred was older than Jack and was married to Maude and they had a son. He'd been at Leeds Road since our first season in the Football League, playing left back and displacing Welsh international Charlie Morris from that position, making it his own right up until the outbreak of the war, by which time he'd become club captain.

In the Football Battalion, Fred was promoted to lance-corporal and Jack was sergeant major. They played matches whilst out in France against other regiments and both played in the regiment's team that beat 34th Brigade, Royal Field Artillery 11-0 in the final of the Divisional Tournament in April 1916 in Hersin, near the Belgian border. Fred's on the back row of this photo, taken from a match played in 1915.

It wasn't all fun and games though. Jack earnt the Military Medal for "Bravery in the Field" and was Mentioned in Despatches for "gallantry". He was actually reported as 'missing, presumed dead' at one point. Fred was injured in the shoulder during the Battle of the Somme. Later he picked up a bad knee injury and was demobbed.

They were both part of the Brentford team that won the London Combination League in the first post war season. After this, they both returned north to resume their careers at Huddersfield Town. The Town however were in dire financial straits at this time and one of the first things they did about this was to sell Jack to Chelsea for a record fee of £2,500. This was shortly after he had won his first international cap for England, scoring in the first minute of his debut.

Last week, I mentioned the Examiner headline that read "TOWN CLUB DEAD" after the proposal to move the entire club to Leeds. The people of Huddersfield were ready to fight back and Fred was one of the main players in the fund raising activity, which as you may have guessed was actually quite successful. Not only was that a success, but also the on field business took a turn for the better and by the end of the season, he had led the Town to not only an FA Cup Final, but also promotion for the first time to the First Division.

Jack meanwhile, in his first season at Chelsea, scored 24 goals and helped them to 3rd in the First Division, their highest finish at the time and also reached the FA Cup semi finals.

Fred played that first season in the First Division, turning out 25 times, but his knee injury eventually forced his retirement, aged 35 in 1921. His final game was in April, a 2-0 defeat at Manchester United.

He'd been awarded a testimonial, which he spent the money on buying the Slubber's Arms pub on Halifax Old Road. It was here on this date in 1922 sadly, where he was found dead at the age of 36. It was said that he died of heart failure due to ammonia poisoning and been suffering "nerve troubles" during the month preceding his death. Suicide? Post traumatic stress disorder? Or what they called "shell shock" back then? So a sad end to the life of a true Town legend, who had earned one cap for England against Ireland in 1920.

Tomorrow, I've another Town suicide to report on as well.

Life went on for his old colleague Jack down in London though and during the next summer he began his other career as a film star, playing himself in a silent movie called The Winning Goal. This led him to another alternative career. He had a fine tenor voice and as such became a star in the music halls. Such was his success at this that he considered packing in football to take this up full time, but stayed at Stamford Bridge, totalling 47 goals in 99 matches before transfering back up north, signing for Everton in 1925.

Up in Liverpool he continued to work the halls, playing 69 times for the Toffees, scoring 29 goals. Then he had a couple of seasons at Plymouth scoring 72 goals in 90 matches, before going back to London in 1927 and becoming a Millwall legend. He scored twice on his debut for the Lions in a 9-1 win against Coventry City.

He finished as top scorer in his three seasons at the Den, totalling 77 goals and helping them win promotion to the 2nd division. And all through this time he continued to entertain the masses in the music halls and even had a signature song, My Blue Heaven, which reports of the time say the audience always joined in lustily with the chorus.

If you're unfamiliar with the tune, this is it. Just picture yourself in an old 1920s music hall in London listening and singing along to this.....

He left Millwall in 1931, winding down his football career at Folkestone, but before his retirement he had starred in another football themed film, The Greater Game, in 1930. Filmed mainly at Stamford Bridge, it has the first credited role for Rex Harrison.

He continued with the singing career and landed a record deal with Parlaphone Records and toured the country. Later he would become manager back at Millwall, leading them to the Wartime Cup Final in 1945. He spent four years as manager there, before becoming a pub landlord at the White Hart in New Cross.

He died in Kensington in 1966, aged 72. Now there's another one who's life story would make a great film.

[Lord Snooty]

November 15:

Yesterday I wrote about Fred Bullock and the rumours around his death being that he actually committed suicide. Today we have another Town player who tragically did the same thing. Fred had poisoned himself in 1921. But on this date in 2016, Bobby Campbell was found dead after hanging himself in his garage.

He was 60 years old at the time and was born in Belfast in 1956. Starting out at Aston Villa, he came to Town in 1975 when we were on that great downer from the First to the Fourth Division. He stayed for a couple of seasons before he was sold to Sheffield United.

Known for being a bit of a daft lad, he was always leading the lads astray. One famous incident talked about a lot at the time was when he led the mud soddened team, out on a training run, through the back seat of the car belonging to manager Tom Johnston, a brand new white Rover 2000. That was in his second spell, which didn't last long after he broke his leg in a match with Newport County at Leeds Road.

He then played for Halifax Town before going to Billy Bantam's Circus and becoming a Manningham legend, twice. He scored 76 goals for them in his first spell there and another 45 after a short time away with Derby County.

Earlier in his career, he'd been picked for the Northern Ireland u18s but was banned for life after another prank that went wrong and caused a car crash. However, following a petition by fans to get his ban overturned, he was picked for his country in 1982, only gaining two caps though, but getting a place in the squad for the 1982 World Cup. He didn't get a game.

After retiring from the game, he took up stewardship of Lindley Working Men’s Club, but in 2013, he was dismissed by the club after he and his wife were accused of fraud, but the charges were dropped after the case was taken to court. Did this have any bearing on his decision to take his own life? Don't know. Sad end to a great character of the game.

His funeral was attended by hundreds at Huddersfield Parish Church, with coachloads coming across from Bradford. Former team mates and friends, Alan Starling, Peter Jackson, Terry Yorath, Stuart McCall, Terry Dolan and Andy Booth were there.

So Bobby was a Bradford legend, more than a Town legend. This next player, who died on this date in 1946, was definitely a Huddersfield Town legend, but also a Scotland legend after scoring a hat trick against England. I talk of course about Alex Jackson.

He revolutionised the role of the winger in the 20s and the media gave him the nickname The Gay Cavalier. Born in 1905 in Renton, West Dunbartonshire, he played for Dumbarton. But then he and his brother went out to the States to visit another brother and ended up staying and playing for Bethlehem Steel.

On a trip back home after a couple of years, he ended up staying again. He signed for Aberdeen. And that's when Herbert Chapman stepped in. It was days before Herbert left to join Arsenal, so this was like a leaving present for the people of Huddersfield.

In those days, players didn't have agents, so Chapman travelled north to meet Alex's dad in Renton. After talking the old man round, they all went to the pub to celebrate, and on hearing that this famous football manager was in town, the entire population, it is said, were in the pub and good old Herbert bought a round of drinks for everybody.

Alex had a fantastic career with us, winning the league title in 1926 and by the time he left, he'd scored 89 goals for us, placing him now in 8th place in the all time goal scorers chart, having recently been overtaken by Jordan Rhodes.

He'd gone to Chelsea after us and it didn't work out. And sadly by the age of 28 his game was over.

When the 2nd World War started, Alex joined the Army. He fought with the Eighth Army in north Africa, but was injured in Libya. He stayed on in the army once the war had finished and was in Egypt on this date in 1946 when tragedy struck. He was in the Suez zone and whilst driving an army truck, it over turned and he was killed, dying of the head injuries he sustained before arrival at hospital. And so the Gay Cavalier, the greatest footballer in the world, was no more.

He is buried in the Fayid War Cemetery, a patch of land on the western shore of Egypt’s Great Bitter Lake. He was Major AS Jackson by this time. He was only 41 years old.

And now to the latest in the saga of the proposed Leeds takeover of 1919. On this date, Town played Coventry City at Leeds Road in Division Two. The last home game had seen less than 3,000 turn up for the 3-0 win against Fulham. The crowd was almost doubled for this one, just over a week after the Examiner declared that the club was dead.

It was another fantastic win, to follow up last week's 2-0 win away at Coventry, we beat them 5-0 this time. Sammy Taylor and Jack Swann both scored twice to add to an own goal. After the game, a meeting was held on the pitch in front of the main stand where the crowd was addressed by a couple of directors and the Chief Constable of the Police. It was announced that Amos Brook Hirst had taken the role of chairman after John Hilton Crowther had gone to Leeds.

It was also announced that a bond scheme would be introduced. Club skipper Fred Bullock was one of the main men in this scheme, as were directors Harry Rayner and Dick Parker (who was later chairman and was still on the Board in the 1970s). They would tour the district, drumming up support for the club and selling hundreds of one pound shares.

So Leeds United were the despised ones trying to steal our club. By the time this date came around in 2008, they were still despised but for probably different reasons. We all hate Leeds scum, yeah?

This was our centenary season. We'd made it, despite all those shenanigans back in the eleventh year of our club's existence. And today we went over to Bellend Road where a massive crowd of 32,028 came out to see the 'Udders.

It didn't start well for us with yond wierd prick, Robert Snodgrass scoring after only four minutes. Town levelled in the first minute of the second half though with hare lipped hero Joe Skarz scoring his first ever (and only) Town goal.

Gerry Murphy was caretaker manager on this occasion, standing in in between Stan Ternent and Lee Clark and he made the master stroke of bringing the ice cream man, Danny Cadamarteri on. The game was drawing to a conclusion as a draw when Caddy got the ball in the last minute of injury time. But instead of going to the corner flag to settle for a well earned point, he set off for the penalty area, squared the ball to the unmarked Michael Collins shinned it into the net, wrong footing the Leeds goalie.

Absolute scenes! I jumped higher than I've ever jumped at a football ground. The bloke behind must've jumped even higher as he landed on top of me.

What a finish and the first win at the Big Yellow Skip since 1983. Get in!

Have a look at this.......