[Lord Snooty]

February 22:

Well first of all, it's a happy 21st birthday to not one, but two of our young players, born on the same day in 2001. They are Ben Jackson and Micah Obiero.

Ben was born in Stcokport and is now on loan at Doncaster, where he made his Rovers debut in a 5-0 home defeat against Rotherham. To be fair, he was a second half substitute and they were 2-0 down when he came on at half time.

But for us, he has 3 appearances, sadly all defeats, so we won't dwell on that. He spent last season at Bolton where he played five times and scored once, in a 1-0 win at Morecambe.

Micah was born in Redbridge, in that there London and has one Town first team appearance to his name. That was coming on as a half time sub in the last game of the season down at Millwall, just after Danny Cowley had been sacked and Danny Schofield was in as caretaker.

He has had a loan out at Carlisle, scoring once in a CheckaPizzaPaintPotSherpaVanWindscreen Trophy match against the Villa u23s. He also made one sub appearance in a short loan spell at the Shay.

Born a few years before these two, in 1952, so celebrating his 70th birthday today is the goal scoring machine of the Mick Buxton team, Ian Robins.

He started his career with Oldham and was part of their team that won promotions from the 4th up to the 2nd Division and on the way up, he scored a hat trick in a 3rd Division match against Town when we got stuffed 6-0 at Boundary Park. Buxton made him his first signing when he got the job in 1978 and he went on to become a massive part in our rise from the 4th to the 2nd Division as well.

He scored 25 league goals in the 79/80 season when we won the 4th Division title. His two goals in the 2-1 win at Leeds Road on the final day of the season were the 100th and 101st league goals of the campaign. In total, he got 67 goals for the Terriers and stands in equal 14th place with another goal scoring machine, Marcus Stewart.

Unfortunately he got a few injuries in the 3rd Division and decided to retire at the end on 81/82 when he bought a newsagent's shop in Wigan. A devastating blow to the club as we had just lost Steve Kindon and Peter Fletcher to injuries as well. His partnerships with both those strikers will always be remembered fondly by us Town fans of a certain age, ie knocking on a bit. Can't believe he's 70 though. Where does the time go?

Back in time now to our successful run to FA Cup glory one hundred years ago in 1922. Today we have the replay against Blackburn Rovers in the 3rd round (5th nowadays). And after drawing one apiece at Ewood Park on the Saturday, 31,899 spectators came to Leeds Road on the Tuesday afternoon to see the mighty blue n white stripes beat the odd looking blue n white quarters 5-0. Frank Mann scored again to add to his goal on Saturday then we had two each from Ernie Islip and Billy Smith.

We have another home tie in the quarter finals, that's against Millwall on March the 4th. Can't wait. 

The next game on this date was in 1930 and another big victory, 4-1 against Sheffield Wednesday, but after that, only one more win and some real down times.

That solitary win was in 2003 at Oakwell against Barnsley with an Andy Booth goal. Low points include a home defeat by Halifax Town, losing 2-1 in 1975 with an Alan Gowling penalty all we had to show as we were stuck on the very bottom rung of the 3rd Division.

Other teams we have failed to beat on this date include Portsmouth in 1983, Reading in 1992, Tranmere in 2005, Dagenham & Redbridge in 2011, Wednesday in 2014 and most recently, a 3-1 defeat at the Liberty Stadium against Swansea in 2020 with Steve Mounié grabbing a late equaliser, only for the Swans to go and bag another two.