[Lord Snooty]

September 28:

Three birthdays today. Born in 1949 and so celebrating his 73rd birthday today is Geoff Hutt, the left back of our glorious 69/70 2nd Division champions team. He came into the side when Billy Legg was injured in a car crash and made his debut in an away game at Oxford in 1969.

He stuck around through the good times and the bad and the even badder, like dropping all the way to the 4th Division. By the time he'd left in 1976, he'd clocked up 277 appearances, putting him in 28th position at the moment in our all time appearances chart.

After us, he went to the Netherlands playing for Haarlem, before coming back to Yorkshire with York City and then Halifax Town.

Also celebrating today, a 34th birthday is the son of Mrs Filthy-Carpets, Lee Novak. He was born in Newcastle upon Tyne in 1988. Signed by Lee Clark for the Terriers in 2009, he was part of a fantastic attacking line up with Jordan Rhodes, Theo Robinson, Gary Roberts and Anthony Pilkington.

He scored 42 goals for us, which puts him in 38th equal in our all time goal scorers chart, level with Bob Kelly and Ronnie Jepson.

Don't know what he's up to these days now he's hung his boots up. He was playing at Billy Bantam's Circus before deciding to retire.

And another one. Born in 1969 and so it's 53 today for Nico Vaesen. He was born in Hasselt in Belgium and is possibly the best goalkeeper ever to pull on a Town shirt. His Town debut didn't last long, rushing out of his goal to make an interception after ten minutes, getting it all wrong and getting sent off. In the days before huge subs benches, midfielder Marcus Browning had to go in goal.

He more than made up for that error though, going on to win the Player of the Season. He was the last Town keeper to win it before Lee Nicholls won it last season.

Signed by Peter Jackson, Nico played almost every game of his three seasons with us and was probably the only position that Steve Bruce didn't tinker with.

He now works in football management and consultancy.

So today's question. Who's the best? Vaesen or Nicholls? Or somebody else? Alex Smithies? Danny Ward? Tim Clarke?

Upon the field of play, Mick Buxton and his merry men had the chance to go top of the 4th Division with a Friday night victory at Stockport County, before everybody else played on the Saturday. And they took that chance, on this date in 1979. The previous match had been the 7-1 win against Port Vale and this was a 2-1 win at Edgeley Park. Goals for Town came from Micky Laverick and Peter Hart. I think I was still in that Spanish airport while this was going on.

Anyway, we bounced between 1st, 2nd and 3rd for the rest of the season, but of course, ended it in first place.


We had a 6-0 win three years later on this date in 1982. It was in the 3rd Division against Orient at Leeds Road. It wasn't a great start to the season and we didn't win a game until matchday 6, a 2-0 win at home to Oxford. This game with the O's was matchday 7 and moved us up to 14th. We would be in 2nd before December started and at the end of the season, won automatic promotion for the last time to date.

So a poor start to the season doesn't mean we can't get promoted.

The six goals in this Tuesday evening game were scored by Colin Russell, Mark Lillis, Daral Pugh, Dave Sutton and a couple from Brian Stanton.


On this date in 2004, we had our only ever meeting with Morecambe so far. It was in the FL Trophy, known at the time as the LDV Vans Trophy. The FL had decided to invite a few of the top sides in the Conference into the competition and Morecambe were one of those. We were in League One.

And it was the League One side who won, at the John McAlpharm Stadium, by a score of 3-0. It was goal less in the first half but then David Mirfin scored, Junior Mendes scored a penalty and then Lee Fowler wrapped it all up in injury time.


And finally, Esther. We won last season, on this date in 2021. Another cracking game that I missed. It was the 3-2 home win against Blackburn Rovers. Neither myself or Amelia were feeling well and as the game was on telly, decided to stop at home and watch it.

Town scored first, Álex Vallejo scoring his one and only goal for the club in what turned out to be his last match. He got injured, what seemed a minor injury, kept him out for the rest of the season.

One nil to the Terriers at half time, it was 1-1 after 57 minutes when Ben Brereton Díaz equalised. They were only level for three minutes though as Danny Ward put us back in front with a header from a pin point Sorba Thomas cross.

But then in the 65th minute, Rovers were level again after Naby Sarr went in wild on Díaz, who got up to take the penalty.

Town weren't giving up though despite the set back and Wardy won it heading home after Harry Toffolo nodded a Danel Sinani cross back into his path. Whoo-hoo!