[Lord Snooty]

October 4:

Billy Price was born on this date in 1917, in a village in Shropshire called Wrockwardine. He had ten years at Huddersfield Town, as a centre forward, but only scored 31 goals. Not much of a return.

Well that's not strictly true. His career was interrupted by the war, seriously interrupted. He was 19 years old when he came to Leeds Road and made his debut in an Easter Monday match at the Baseball Ground against Derby County when the mighty Blue n Whites slammed the Rams 4-0. Billy scored. He scored again on the next day when Derby came up to ours and Billy got one in a 2-0 win.

He had taken the place of Willie McFadyen in those two games, but Willie was back for the next game, the FA Cup Final of 1938 at Wembley against Preston North End. As we learned the other day when the Diaries of Robert Gordon were posted on the HTAFC Heritage Site, the reserves had an away game at Bury on the same day, so I'm guessing Billy would be on the coach to Gigg Lane instead of the Twin Towers.

Billy scored 24 goals in the next season, including seven goals in the FA Cup run that went all the way to the semis. The next season, 1939/40, started but only lasted three matches before being abandoned because the country was now at war. Billy was the only Town player to register a goal in those three abandoned games and so was the only one who had a goal chalked off of his tally.

Football was soon back again though as the authorities decided it would be good for morale on the home front to keep the game going and so regional leagues were started. Robert Gordon, Graham Bailey and Harold Wood all got jobs at Brook Motors for the war effort. I don't know what Billy did, but he probably did something similar because he was playing for Town throughout the whole of the wartime.

And what a few seasons of goal scoring he had. The opposition at times must've been a bit low on standard as many of the top players joined up and none of these games count in official stats, but I've just totted up Billy's totals and he scored 190 goals during the war.

He scored a hat trick in an 11-0 win over Rochdale in 1940 and scored seven in an 8-0 win against Crewe in 1943. How strong a line up those two had, we'll not know, which is another reason these stats don't count. Which is a shame for Billy, because if they did, he would be well out in front of our goal scoring chart. George Brown, Jimmy Glazzard and Andy Booth are the top three with 159, 154 and 150 goals.

Adding up Billy's goals, 31 officially in the League and FA Cup, 190 wartime goals and the one he had chalked off in 1939, makes a grand total of 222.

In 1947 he was transferred to Reading. Then on to Hull City, Bradford City and finishing his career in the non league with Winsford United.

He died in 1995, aged 77.

Bill Shankly was the greatest man ever to manage Liverpool. So much so that he has gates dedicated to him at Anfield. But on this date in 1958, he was still manager of Huddersfield Town and Liverpool were the visitors for a 2nd Division match at Leeds Road.

The Reds left with red faces as Town hammered them 5-0. Ex Sheffield Utd winger Derek Hawksworth scored twice and Les Massie, cricket star Ken Taylor and future World Cup winner Ray Wilson, all scored one each.

On this date in 1983, we had a League Cup 2nd round 1st leg match with 1st Division high flyers Watford. They were a proper club back then, managed by Graham Taylor and owned by pop star Elton John and were runners up in Division One in the season just gone. We were in Division Two, having just won promotion under the management of Mick Buxton.

So we were very much the underdog as the Hornets came up to Leeds Road. But Buxton's boys had other ideas. David Cowling gave us the lead. I think we went two nil up before they pulled one back, but I'm not sure. Doesn't matter. The Town goal was an own goal, but the Watford goal was one of the best goals I ever saw at Leeds Road. I've never seen a replay of it, so my memory could be wrong, but it was scored by their young left winger, John Barnes, who would go on to be one of the best players in the world.

The 2nd leg is in three weeks time down at Vicarage Road. Can't wait!