[Lord Snooty]

Huddersfield Town v Sheffield Wednesday
The Sky Bet Championship Play Offs Semi Final 1st leg
Sunday May 14th - 12:00 ko
at the John Smith's Stadium

Well well well, little old Huddersfield Town have made it to the Play Offs in the Championship for the very first time and will play the sleeping Premier League giants of Sheffield Wednesday. Of course, we have no chance of winning this. We are just a small yapping terrier. But as our beloved head coach keeps reminding us, we are aggressive and we never give up.

A brief history of Sheffield Wednesday's Play Off campaigns: Well obviously for most of the lifespan of the Football League Play Offs, Sheffield Wednesday weren't interested because they were a massive Premier League club.
By the time they made it to their first ever play off, they'd fallen through a couple of relegation trapdoors to what is now called League One, ie the 3rd division. And what's more, they only went and won it!
This was the 2004/05 season. Town had won the 4th division play offs the previous season in Cardiff against Mansfield and we were now in the same league as Wednesday again. We finished 9th this season and they finished 5th, behind Tranmere and Brentford, but one place above the mighty Hartlepool Utd. So Wednesday had a two legged semi against our old play off rivals, Brentford.
A Jon-Paul McGovern goal gave them a slender lead in the home leg to take down to Griffin Park. Was it enough? Yes it was. Goals from Lee Peacock and Chris Brunt put them well in charge of the tie before the Bees got a late consolation and the Owls were on the road to Cardiff to face Hartlepool, who had beaten Tranmere Rovers on penalties.
As I mentioned earlier, they won, but it was a struggle. With eight minutes left in normal time they were 2-1 down to the monkey hangers, but as so often happens with this lot, they got a dodgy penalty and Pools got a red card. Steve McLean scored the penalty and the tie went to extra time where another couple of goals gave Wednesday a 4-2 victory.

And that was their only Play Off campaign until they qualified again last season. Did they win it? Course not, or they wouldn't still be in it now. They got to the final though, playing Hull City and getting beaten 1-0 by that classic strike from Mo Diamé.
This all coming after a two legged tie against Brighton, who finished the first leg with ten men, not through red cards but through dirty Wendy kicking them to bits and having four players leave the field seriously injured. Goals from Ross Wallace and Kieran Lee gave them a 2-0 lead to take to the Amex Stadium. Lewis Dunk put the Seagulls back in the tie, but Wallace equalised on the night soon after and t'Owls saw the match out.

So they've won one final and lost one final. Won one semi final and now it's time to lose a semi final.                  

A brief history of Huddersfield Town's Play Off campaigns: We Town fans are more experienced in the heart pounding, palm sweating, underpant staining play offs than our friends from the Sausage Cottage (is that still there?   ). We are three time play off winners. We have three stars on our badge to prove it.          

Not going to go into it all in detail, but here is a rundown of our previous triumphs and failure.

1992: 3rd division
Peterborough United 2–2 Huddersfield Town (Onuora, Robinson og)
Huddersfield Town (Starbuck) 1–2 Peterborough United


1995: 3rd division
Huddersfield Town (Billy) 1–1 Brentford
Brentford 1–1 Huddersfield Town (Booth) (a.e.t.)
Town win 4-3 on pens

Bristol Rovers 1–2 Huddersfield Town (Booth, Billy) (at Wembley)

2002: 3rd division
Huddersfield Town 0–0 Brentford
Brentford 2–1 Huddersfield Town (Booth)

2004: 4th division
Lincoln City 1–2 Huddersfield Town (Onuora, Mirfin)
Huddersfield Town (Schofield pen, Edwards) 2–2 Lincoln City

Huddersfield Town 0–0 Mansfield Town (a.e.t.) (at Millenium Stadium, Cardiff)
Town win 4-1 on pens

2006: 3rd division
Barnsley 0–1 Huddersfield Town (Taylor-Fletcher)
Huddersfield Town (Worthington) 1–3 Barnsley

2010: 3rd division
Huddersfield Town 0–0 Millwall
Millwall 2–0 Huddersfield Town

2011: 3rd division:
Bournemouth 1–1 Huddersfield Town (Kilbane)
Huddersfield Town (Peltier, Ward, Kay) 3–3 Bournemouth (a.e.t.)
Town win 4-2 on pens

Huddersfield Town 0–3 Peterborough United (at Old Trafford)

2012: 3rd division:
Milton Keynes Dons 0–2 Huddersfield Town (Rhodes, Hunt)
Huddersfield Town (Rhodes) 1–2 Milton Keynes Dons

Huddersfield Town 0–0 Sheffield United (a.e.t.) (at Wembley)
Town win 8-7 on pens

We have had 8 previous play off campaigns, winning 3 and losing 5. We have never won a home leg in any of our play offs. But our penalty shoot out record is 100% successful, having won four out of four. Two of our goalscoring heroes from the last campaign, Hunt and Rhodes, are now at Sheffield Wednesday.
So if we don't win on Sunday, don't get stressed. We have more chance of winning it there in a penalty shoot out and then again at Wembley after a goalless 120 minutes.                          

Can your heart stand up to it?

[jjamez]

In answer to the last question. No.

[SHEP_HTAFC]

Great thread Snoots.
I really don't rate our chances in this 2 legged play off.
We just can't seem to beat Wednesday. And I really don't like these 12:00 starts at the weekend.
It's all pointing to a really disappointing end to the season....after the best season we've had in 45 years.
Would I have taken losing in the play offs at the start of the season.....yes. Would I take it now? Less so.

[Lord Snooty]

All 2,000 tickets for the away leg have sold out.

[WakeyTerrier]

Never in doubt the away allocation selling out, plenty of people moaning about priority out there but they all had the chance to join the ToT membership at the start of the season.

Shep, you're not on your own in thinking our chances are slim. I've thought for a few weeks that our legs have gone and the attitude seems to have changed but that could just be a multitude of things adding up.

we've collected a fair few injuries to key players of late...Kachunga,Brown,Palmer all missing in one way or another and all vital to us having a chance of winning

Fear/nerves- the further we've got this season the more tension seems to creeping in, most certainly amongst the support who have started to whine a lot more in the past 4/5/6weeks..are the players also feeling this?

[Lord Snooty]

We appear to have run out of steam again, just like last season. Hopefully we can get the boiler stoked up again and stuff these friggers.

[jjamez]

Seems like a few people are having issues with tickets for both home and away games.

I asked for mine posting when I purchased online. As of yet I haven't got them, but its still early days

[WakeyTerrier]

Wagner himself has said he couldn't wait for the season to end so he could get stuck into the play offs. Maybe the players have been saving themselves....lets hope so

[Lord Snooty]

Why have we only got 2,000 anyway in a stand that must hold around 5,000? Is it tit for tat because we've only given them half of the south stand?

[WakeyTerrier]

All 4 clubs agreed on 2000 and £20 a ticket. Our allocation on a normal match day for away fans is probably the smallest and so we probably set the level