[Lord Snooty]

March 18:

It's a happy 38th birthday today to Gary Roberts. Born in Liverpool in 1984, he is currently out of work, having been given the boot from his coaching role at Ipswich in December when manager Paul Cook was sacked.

In his first spell at Ipswich, he was part of the team that relegated Leeds Utd down to League One. It was his corner kick that Alan Lee headed home and sparked a pitch invasion, in which Gary was assaulted. Strange that Leeds never got a ground closure or anything for that. Scum!

Anyway, he had signed for the Tractorz from Accrington Stanley and then in 2008, he signed for us. He cost a quarter of a million, but was well worth the money. Probably the best signing made by Stan Ternent in his short time in charge.

He had four seasons with us and was part of a great League One side. His time with us culminated in Play Off success and the game at Wembley against the Blunts was his last one in the bright blue n white as Simon Grayson, for some reason, never offered him a new contract and he ended up at Swindon.

It's 50 years ago today that we last played in the FA Cup quarter finals. That was in 1972 at Birmingham City's St Andrews ground. We were in the First Division, they were in the Second, but it was they who won.

We had beaten them on the same ground in the competition in the previous season, so optimism was high once again of reaching the semi finals for the first time since 1939. Some odd bits of history repeating took place though. In the previous game, Bob Latchford had injured our keeper, Terry Poole. He had to go off and in the days before substitute keepers, Terry Dolan went in goal.

In the game on this day, Latchford again injured our keeper, David Lawson this time, but it was Dolan who again went in the nets. He'd kept a clean sheet last time, but Lawson's injury was a major factor in this defeat. It was a 3-1 loss, with Latchford getting one of them. Malcolm Page and Bob Hatton getting the others, with Trevor Cherry getting ours.

Back in the 1920 promotion charge, we played the 3rd game of the 14 match unbeaten run to the end of the season. That's the 2nd tier unbeaten run that our present squad has just beaten. Anyway, this was at Anlaby Road against Hull City, who we had just beaten 2-0 at Leeds Road a few days earlier. Sammy Taylor scored twice in the home win. He got a hat trick in the one on this date, as Town won 4-1, with Jack Swann getting the other.