[Lord Snooty]

November 25:

Today's the day. Having started playing football at school, on this date in 1967 my dad decided to take my seven year old self to my first ever Huddersfield Town match, at home to QPR and if you look at the programme picture below, you'll see I saw two of the greatest players of the next decade in my Leeds Road debut. Though we probably didn't know it at the time, but what a couple of stars 19 year old Frank Worthington and the slightly older Rodney Marsh turned out to be.

It was the first league meeting of the two clubs, us having spent most of the time in Division One and they in the 3rd Division South. The Hoops had had a little time in the 2nd Division after they won promotion under the management of Dave Mangnall in the 40s. Had to get him another mention.

They were back up again after winning the 3rd division title and had showed the footballing world how good they were by winning the League Cup at the back end of that last season. That was a remarkable come back, overturning a first half 2-0 deficit to win 3-2 against West Brom. Marsh got one of those goals. Roger Morgan and Mark Lazarus scored the others and they both also played in today's game.

Town were in 13th in the league at the start of play and won this one 1-0. It was the fantastic Frank who got the winner. And I was hooked. My dad took me as often as he could, but sadly I never got to see any of our League Cup run to the semi finals.

Queens Park Rangers had the last laugh this season though. The won promotion as runners up to Ipswich.

Here's that programme.......

On this date in 2018, we went down to Molineux to take on Wolves, our Premier League bitches!

Having started the season without a win in the first ten games, David Wagner had finally turned the ship around and a win against Fulham followed by a draw with West Ham had seen us rise from the foot of the table. This was a Sunday lunchtime Sky Sports special though and when the Saturday games had been played, we had dropped back down to the bottom.

This one however, was something else. The best team performance in our short two season spell in the Prima Donna League, with the lads having enjoyed a sunshine training break in Marbella in the international break, really playing some fantastic football. It helped that today we were playing Wolverhampton, having done the double over them in the promotion season and beating them 10 times in the last 12 games, we were definitely their bogey team.

And how the Wolves fans wailed about it after we stuffed them again.

"We shouldn't be losing to rubbish like Huddersfield!"       

We got off to a flyer. In the sixth minute, a good exchange down the left hand side between Philip Billing and Erik Durm, set the German left back loose to play a perfect pass to Aaron Mooy, who coolly slotted the ball home from the edge of the area.

The brilliant bald headed beauty added a second, scoring direct from a free kick in the second half, expertly bending the ball around, rather than over the wall and we won the game 2-0. But it was such a dominating performance, Wolves couldn't have complained if we had scored six or seven. We were that good.

Steve Mounié had his best game since that debut down at Selhurst Park. Little Alex Pritchard played like the player we thought we'd signed in the first place. Jonathan Hogg was once again being raved about by the fans, saying he ought to be in the England squad. And the boy Billing. Absolutely brilliant. His goal line clearance was out of this world.

You don't believe it? If you're bored with all this World Cup crap on tv today, have a watch of the full 90 minute playback......

The three points not only took us off the bottom of the table, but got us as high as 14th, overtaking Fulham, Cardiff, Southampton, Burnley, Crystal Palace and Newcastle United.

So we've got our bad spell out of the way, now let's keep it going. Up next, a very winnable home game when Chris Hughton brings Michael Oliver his Brighton team up to the John Smith's Stadium.

What could possibly go wrong?            

[HerefordBull]

Blimey Snoots, you're not as old as I thought.

Whippersnapper.

[Lord Snooty]

Haha. All that 1920s stuff is what I've read in books. I wasn't actually there.

[Lord Snooty]

November 26:

On this date in 1955, Sir Amos Brook Hirst died, aged 77.

He, if you've been reading this all year will know, was one of the founding directors of Huddersfield Town AFC, went on to become chairman during the glory years and then became chairman of the Football Association. He was born in Huddersfield in 1878 and was a keen rugby player before a shoulder injury forced him to concentrate on football.

He was a solicitor and became the vice-president when the club was first set up and was one of the main men behind the drive to save the club during the 1919 crisis. He became chairman in 1925 and stayed as such up until 1941 when he became chairman of the FA, having previously been on the Football League's management committee from 1931 to 1939.

During his time at the head of the FA, he accompanied many dignitaries to football matches, including in 1944 when he was sat with King George VI and Queen Elizabeth (pictured below). They must've enjoyed the match, a bit of a goal fest with England beating Scotland 6-2 at Wembley.

Others he entertained include Winston Churchill, Clement Atlee and varous other European kings. The young Princess Elizabeth attended her first footy match in his company. When she eventually became the Queen, he was knighted in 1954.

Suffering ill health, he resigned from the FA and later died on this date in 1955. The home game with West Brom later in the day had a two minute silence, as did the England v Spain match, later in the week.

The game with West Bromwich Albion on this sad day in 1955, saw the team inspired to victory, which came on the back of seven straight defeats and had us bottom of Division One. We eventually got relegated at the end of the season, so it was but a temporary inspiration.

Anyway, it was a 1-0 win and Vic Metcalfe scored the goal from the penalty spot.

[Lord Snooty]

November 27:

On this date in 1947, Leeds Road held it's one and only full England international match. It was against the Netherlands and England won it easily in front of a crowd of 32,435 on a Wednesday afternoon by a whopping scoreline of 8-2.

No debutants in the England team, but there were a few stars of the next decade earning caps in the early stages of their career and this is how the team, selected by new manager Walter Winterbottom, lined up:- Frank Swift (Man C), Laurie Scott (Arsenal), George Hardwick © (M'boro), Billy Wright (Wolves), Neil Franklin (Stoke), Harry Johnston (Blackpool), Tom Finney (Preston), Raich Carter (Derby), Tommy Lawton (Chelsea), Wilf Mannion (M'boro), Bob Langton (Blackburn).

The half time score was 6-1, but the first goal wasn't scored until the 24th minute by Tommy Lawton, who then added the second four minutes later. He was the First Division's leading scorer in the two seasons before the war, playing for Everton and he was one of the names I remember my dad talking about. He never mentioned going to this game though, he would've been 18 at the time. Could've been doing his national service. Don't know.

If he had been there, he would've seen Raich Carter make it 3-0 in the 30th minute. Another prolific goalscorer and this wasn't his first goal at Leeds Road. He'd guested for the Town during the war whilst serving as an auxiliary fire bobby and later in the RAF as a PT instructor. He scored a hat trick for us in the first wartime league match against Bradford PA in 1939. He'd made his name banging in goals for Sunderland but having lost such a big chunk of his football career to the war, he was now playing for Derby.

Wilf Mannion made it 4-0 four minutes later. He's the one with the statue outside the Riverside Stadium. A minute later Lawton made it five, before the Dutch pulled one back through Ko Bergman. The first half scoring was completed in the 44th minute when Tom Finney, the Preston Plumber scored to make it 6-1.

Only three goals in the second half. Carter scored his second and Lawton scored his fourth before Kick Smit, the veteran Haarlem striker scored a late consolation to end the match at England 8, Netherlands 2.

Back to the good half a season with Steve Bruce in charge now. We had won six consecutive league matches, beating Barnsley, Sheff Utd, Ipswich, Swindon, Nottingham Forest and West Brom. That had us up to 2nd in what is now called the Championship, but that run came to an end with a surprise 2-0 midweek defeat at Walsall before the game on this date in 1999, a trip to play Manchester City at Maine Road.

It was my one and only visit to Maine Road and what a win it was. Only 1-0 but we absolutely battered them in our great red n black striped Panasonic kit. The goal came from Chris Beech, one of the best headed goals I've ever seen. Just look at the leap and the power in this one......

Today's Town legend's birthday is that of David Cowling, who was born in Doncaster on this date in 1958, making him 64 today. Tom Johnston signed him from Mansfield in 1977, but it was Mick Buxton who gave him his debut a year later in a match away at Barnsley, the one where me and my dad sat behind Charlie Williams.

That was a 1-0 defeat, but Dave scored three memorable goals in 1-0 wins. In 80/81 he got the winner against them there Tykes in front of 28,901 spectators, our record crowd for a 3rd Division game. A couple of seasons later, he got the winner at Bellend Road in the League Cup that I mentioned a few days ago. And then at the end of that season, he scored the winner against Newport at home (pictured below), the one where we won promotion (and I missed  ).

Dave is in both of our top trumps tables. He's 8th in the all time appearances list with 392. And he scored 48 goals, putting him in joint 26th alongside Frank Worthington and Duncan Shearer.

After leaving us, he once again teamed up with Buxton at Scunthorpe, scoring the first ever goal at the new Glanford Park.

There are other birthdays today of players sadly no longer with us. Edwardian playboy, Welsh international goalkeeper and first world war hero Leigh Richmond Roose was born on this date in Holt in 1877. I've written quite a lot about him this year.

Tony Leighton was born in Leeds on this date in 1939. He died of motor neurone disease only 38 years later.

And the Chopper himself, Jimmy McGill was born in Partick on this date in 1946. A tough tackling midfielder, hence the nickname, he played in that first match of mine that I wrote about the other day. We got him from Arsenal for whom he played ten times at the top level, making his debut against Leeds in an end of season dead rubber that attracted a crowd at Highbury of less than 5,000. Seems incredible now that that could happen, doesn't it? Less than 5,000 to see Leeds play at Arsenal.

We eventually sold him on to Hull, but before that he was an ever present in our brilliant 69/70 2nd Division champions side.

Jimmy died in 2015, aged 68.

Chopper had played his last match for us just before Brian Clough brought his Derby County team to Huddersfield on this date in 1971. We were doing reasonably at the time, in the First Division and old big 'ead left Leeds Road with nothing as Ian Greaves and his boys won 2-1. Frank Worthington and Jimmy Lawson scored our goals. John McGovern got theirs.

The two points won took us up to 17th in the table, but sadly, still in November, that was the last win we had in the league that season. And it was against the team that would go on to win the league in May when McGovern again scored in a 1-0 win over Liverpool to give Cloughie the first of his league titles. Who did they pip to that title by one point? Leeds United.

We'd already beaten Leeds in the league. Typical Town, we beat the two teams that finished first and second, but won only another four all season.

[Lord Snooty]

November 28:

Archie Taylor, who played in our first ever Football League match in 1910, was born on this day in Dundee in 1879. So he would've been 30 when that first FL game was played, a 1-0 win at Bradford Park Avenue.

Before that, he played for Dundee, then came south to play for Bolton Wanderers in the First Division of the FL. Only got three games there though and dropped into the Southern League with Bristol Rovers, then Brentford and then West Ham, before going back to Scotland and a brief spell with Falkirk. He then signed for the new boys of the Football League, Huddersfield Town, playing in 29 league games and 5 FA Cup games for us.

But then he went and signed for our neighbours, Barnsley. He was made captain and wrote his name in Oakwell legend as the first and so far only man to lift the FA Cup for the Colliers. That was in the 1912 Final replay at Bramall Lane when they beat West Brom 1-0 after extra time. He also played in the first game which finished 0-0.

We have another of the current squad with a birthday today. The scorer of one of our most celebrated Play Off goals, Tom Lees, who of course was credited with the Nahki Wells goal at Hillsborough. 

Tom was born in Birmingham in 1990 and so is 32 today. He started his career with Leeds Utd, scoring another own goal for Town whilst with them.

But after playing for two of our local rivals, all was forgiven last season when he looked nothing like the dummy who'd been given the run around by Town attackers over the years and was one of our best players in that almost successful season.

Happy birthday, Tommy lad.

This date in 1959 was a good day and a bad day for Huddersfield Town. It was a good day as we beat Liverpool 1-0 in a Second Division match at Leeds Road with a Les Massie goal. But a bad day as this was when the Liverpool chairman, Tom Williams, made the approach to Bill Shankly offering him the manager's job at Anfield.

Shanks joked about it afterwards. "How would you like to manage the best club in the world," Williams asked him. "Why? Is Matt Busby retiring?" Was Shankly's witty response.

He had become disillusioned with the lack of ambition from the Town Board and with the potential for success at Liverpool looking more and more appealing, he resigned from his post at Leeds Road a few days later and the rest is history.

[Lord Snooty]

November 29:

On this date in 1967, Huddersfield Town played in the fifth round of the League Cup for the first time and so far, the only time. It came just four days after my dad had taken me to my first ever Town match and I knew absolutely nothing about this match. I've certainly no recollection of it.

It was played against Fulham at Craven Cottage, a team who were currently bottom of the First Division. The Cottage Pies weren't the yo-yo club that they are now. They got relegated at the end of this season and didn't get back to the top tier until 2001.

They still had Johnny Haynes playing for them at this time and he played in this one. He had been England captain and had played in three World Cups and became the first footballer to earn £100 a week. He now has a statue at the stadium.

They also had a young goalscorer in the side who would go on to play for England. He'd also go on to be a star player for Leeds Urinals. I talk of course, about Allan Clarke. Yes, that prick!

We had Frank Worthington though. He'd just got on a run of games, taking the number 9 shirt off Brian Clark and was finding the back of the net. He'd scored his first ever first team goal in the previous round, a 2-0 win at home to West Ham. He'd scored the only goal of the game in that match against QPR at the weekend, his first ever league goal. He scored in this game as well.

It was a 1-1 draw, but I haven't found who scored for Fulham or in what order the goals came. What I do know is that the replay will be back at Leeds Road on the 12th of December for a place in the semi finals.

[HerefordBull]

s-l1600 (1) by Ann Edwards, on Flickr


Joe Gilroy scored for Fulham . Attendance was 20,309.

[Lord Snooty]

November 30:

It's a happy 39th birthday today to Nathan Clarke, who was born on this date in 1983 in Halifax. Our Player of the Season in 2005, he scored one of the famous goals of that decade when he nodded home from a corner at the McAlpharm in 2009 to beat the Leeds Urinals, completing a league double over the Beeston Bums.

Before that, he was a member of our glorious Play Off winning squad of 2004, though he was injured and missed the Final. He almost made 300 appearances for us, but was eventually out for 299, leaving him in 22nd place in our all time appearances chart.

On this date in 1994, Iain Dunn of Huddersfield Town made a little bit of history. It came in a Football League Trophy match, then known as the Auto Windscreens Shield, in a match at home to Lincoln City, played in the first season at the McAlpine Stadium.

If I remember correctly, we were 2-0 down to the Imps when we started to rally in the second half and pulled it back with goals from Gary Crosby and a Ronnie Jepson penalty, to take it to extra time. The FA, at the start of the season, had toyed around with the idea of introducing the Golden Goal rule for extra time and so the Football League went ahead and brought it in for this competition.

So when Dunny struck the winner from the edge of the six yard box, in front of the open end (the Panasonic/Fantastic Media/Big Red Stand hadn't been built yet) to make it 3-2 to the Terriers, it was the first ever Golden Goal. So that was it. Full time. Game over. And those of us in the 5,738 crowd who hadn't gone home before the 90 minutes were up, could now go home and look forward to the draw for the next round, the area quarter final, which we lost against Bury at Gigg Lane. 

Five years later, on this date in 1999, we had another extra time game at home. The Golden Goal rule had been dropped by now and so we had a full 120 minutes of play, though it wasn't without controversy.

It was in the League Cup, known as the Worthington Cup in that season, the 4th round aginst Wimbledon of the Premier League. We'd won at Chelsea in the previous round and the scorer of the winning goal there, Kenny Irons, was in the line up again. As were Nico Vaesen, Steve Jenkins, Kevin Gray, Chris Beech, Dean Gorre, Ben Thornley, Marcus Stewart, Ken Monkou, Jamie Vincent and Clyde Wijnhard.

Beech had scored a brillant goal at the weekend to beat Man City, but he limped off after 34 minutes to be replaced by the woefully inadequate Scott Sellars. Dear, oh dear! Why has he brought this numpty on?

He may have been a numpty, but it was he who opened the scoring, just six minutes after coming on and Town led 1-0 at the break.

It was all Town in the second half and it was just a matter of time before we got the second goal to take us through to the quarter finals for only the second time, when Wimbledon went and equalised through Alan Kimble. We kept pressing for the winner, which should have come from the most stonewall of stonewall penalties you can ever imagine. Obviously it was turned down by the chief blind mouse, a certain Jeff Winter from Middlesbrough. Town chairman, Iain Ayre would later embarrass the club by threatening to take legal action against Winter for not awarding the pen.

So it was 1-1 at full time. Replays in this competition were a thing of the past, so it would be a penalty shoot out if we don't get a winner in the added 30 minutes. Sadly, it was Jason Euell who won it for the Wombles and we had failed once more to get to the quarter finals.

[Lord Snooty]

December 1:

Born in Sheffield in 1948, it's a happy 74th birthday today to our 26th permanent manager, Neil Warnock. Can you believe we've had 19 permanent managers since? Incredible turnaround in such a space of time.

Well what can one write about such a famous footballing character that isn't well known already? Well I can tell you how I thought it was a terrible appointment at the time after the Board had let Ian Ross and his assistant Mick Buxton leave through lack of ambition. Where've we heard that before?

His first season with us was dire, losing the first game under his management 3-0 at home to Reading in the 3rd Division. We were one place above the drop zone at Christmas, having had some diabolical performances, notably a home defeat to bottom club Barnet, a home defeat to Exeter and a 3-0 loss away at Billy Bantam's Circus.

I'd written articles about him in Hanging On The Telephone which were very derogatory and by now I'd made my own personal claim to fame by coming up with the anagram of his name which went into common football speak or what they now call "viral". Even Gary Lineker referred to him as Colin on MOTD.

But of course, I was made to swallow a whole bakery full of Humble Pie when he got us promoted in the next season. 

Never doubted you for a minute, Colin.

But then, no sooner had I put my apologies down in the fanzine, then the gormless pillock went and quit, preferring Plymouth Argyle instead.

Ken Willingham of Huddersfield Town and England was born on this date in 1912, also in Sheffield. He joined Town from Worksop as a 17 year old in 1930 and made his debut in 1932 away at Everton. He kept the number 4 shirt and became the regular right half right up to the start of the war, playing in the three abandoned games of the 39/40 season.

Before that, he had played in the 1938 FA Cup Final and in 1935 he scored the quickest goal in Huddersfield Town history, just ten seconds into the home match with Sunderland, a game we won 1-0.

Ken also had a good England career. Illness forced him to miss his first England cap when he had to withdraw from the squad in 1933 and didn't get a recall until 1937. He scored on his England debut, scoring the 7th goal of the game as the Three Lions won against Finland in Helsinki by a score of 8-0.

That was his only goal for the country, but he was involved with a 7-0 win against Ireland during his career of 12 caps. The most famous, or infamous, match of those 12 came in Berlin in 1938. I've mentioned it before, the 6-3 victory over Hitler's Germany when they were forced into doing that salute.

During the war, our Ken worked in the steel works in Sheffield and continued to turn out for the Town in the Wartime Leagues and also represented England in seven wartime internationals.

After the war, he signed for Sunderland, then went as player/coach to Leeds, before hanging up his boots to become a pub landlord in Hunslet. He briefly came back into the game as coach at Halifax Town.

Ken died in Dewsbury in 1975, aged 62.

Talking of England v Germany. On this date in 1954, England took on West Germany at Wembley and a Huddersfield Town player was in the England team. That was Ron Staniforth at right back, against the Germans who were the World Cup winners in the summer just gone.

England won this one, a friendly match, 3-1 with goals from Roy Bentley of Chelsea, Ronnie Allen of West Brom and Len Shackleton of Sunderland, the great entertainer of the time with the nickname the Clown Prince of Football.

The German goal came from Alfred Beck, scoring in his only international. Another player in the team was making the 3rd of 74 caps for West Germany and that was Uwe Seeler, who played in four World Cups and scored the goal in 1970 that knocked England out in Mexico.

Now then. On this date in 2018, Town were in the Premier League and were quickly turning things around after a poor start to the season. We were on a three match unbeaten run following a win and a draw at home to Fulham and West Ham and then last week's brilliant win at Wolverhampton. Today's opponents were Brighton at home, but the biggest opponent turned out to be the referee, Michael Oliver who gave the worst refereeing performance ever in the whole history of football.

We took the lead in the first minute with Zanka scoring a header from a corner and looked comfortable throughout the first 30 minutes. But then Mr Oliver took centre stage. Steve Mounié went for a 50/50 ball with Brighton's Yves Bissouma. The Brighton lad won the ball, which big Steve realised he wasn't getting it and so pulled his foot away. On doing so, he slightly tickled the shin of his opponent, which the cheat made such a meal of it was embarrassing to watch. The blind man in the middle thought it was a dangerous high challenge and showed Mounie the red card.

If that was a bad decision, the one not to award us a penalty just before half time was preposterous. Pascal Gross had Alex Pritchard in a headlock just as he was about to tap in our second goal. Look at the picture below and tell me that's not a penalty.

To make matters worse, the Seagulls equalised in the 4th minute of first half injury time through Shane Duffy. They then went ahead when Florin Andone scored in the 69th minute. But before the game was over, Oliver once again got a major decision wrong when Erik Durm was scythed down by substitute Leon Balogun and only a yellow card was given.

David Wagner was upset after the match and was very critical of the officiating. It was the start of the downturn in form, with every decision going against us, like there had been a directive from the FA that the Premier League don't want the likes of Hudderfield Town in there.

I can't imagine how Neil Warnock would've reacted.

Just over a month later, Wagner was gone. The revolution was over and this match was the catalyst.

Go on. Tell me this isn't a penalty!