[Lord Snooty]

Cardiff City v Huddersfield Town
The Sky Bet Championship
Tuesday December 1st - 19:00 ko
at the Cardiff City Stadium

Huddersfield Town travel to South Wales to play Cardiff City at the imaginatively named Cardiff City Stadium on Tuesday night, full of confidence following a good win against Middlesbrough on Saturday. Goals from Carel Eiting, Fraizer Campbell and Josh Koroma gave us a 3-2 win, despite starting the match in a terrible fashion and could have been three or four down by the time Eiting popped up on the edge of the area to slot home a similar goal to his strike down at Stoke the week before. Once that goal went in though, the confidence returned and the Terriers ran out convincing winners in the end, even though the ref, Mr Magoo gave Boro a very dodgy penalty to level it up at 2-2. Richard Stearman limped off in the first half to be replaced by Rarmani Edmonds-Green, who had a solid game. Skipper Christopher Schindler should be available though, having missed out on Saturday due to having had concussion. So too Ben Hamer, who has been missing due to Covid protocol, but Ryan Schofield, who has deputised in the last couple of games may well retain his place. All good selection problems for Carlos Corberán.

Cardiff will also be full of confidence after they pumped Luton Town 4-0 at home on Saturday. They were two goals to the good in the opening 10 minutes through Sean Morrison and Mark Harris and three up on the hour with a headed goal from big lad Kieffer Moore. Liverpool loanee Sheyi Ojo completed the scoring late on. Which means that they are still a point and a place below us and let's hope they're still behind us at full time after this game. Another Liverpool loanee, Harry Wilson was credited with two assists in the match, both from his corner kicks and we all know how vulnerable we can be from set pieces, so once again it could be squeaky bums when we're facing them, as always.

Well Cardiff made it to the Play Offs last season, so maybe it's a surprise that they're behind us at this stage of the season. But Swansea made the Play Offs as well and we've already won once in South Wales. Let's make it a double.

Come on Town!




A brief history of Cardiff City: formed in 1899 as Riverside AFC, another cricket club forming a footy team for it's players to keep them fit in the winter. They became known as Cardiff City in 1908 and moved into Ninian Park two years later. They were elected into the Football League for the 1920/21 season.

They rose rapidly. Their first season saw them promoted from the 2nd division as runners up to Birmingham. They then finished 4th in their first season in the top flight, then a drop to 9th in the next one before finishing as runners up to Huddersfield Town in 1923/24. This was the closest ever finish to a Football League season with us getting the first of our three consecutive titles by virtue of a better Goal Average. We have Len Davies to thank. He had a penalty to win the match against Birmingham, but missed and the score remained 0-0. Now if today's rules had applied, Goal Difference, then Cardiff would've won it on Goals Scored as the GD was level. But those were the rules then, so tough titty!

Poor old Davies was left feeling sorry for himself again in 1925 as Cardiff made it to the FA Cup Final. He was out injured as the Bluebirds were beaten 1-0 by Sheffield Utd. They didn't do as well in the league as we took our 2nd title, finishing 11th. And they finished 16th as we completed the Thrice Champions of the First Division. They had another bad day against Sheffield Utd as well during this season, losing 11-2 at Brammall Lane. This is still their record defeat.

Things got better in the next season when they won their only major trophy by winning the 1927 FA Cup Final and taking it out of England for the one and only time. Hughie Ferguson is credited with the goal as they beat Arsenal 1-0, but the dubious goals panel may well have given it as an own goal by the Arsenal keeper Dan Lewis. Len Davies finally got his hands on a winners medal and would go on to be Cardiff's all time leading goal scorer with a whopping 179 from 371 appearances.

They followed that up by winning the Charity Shield 2-1 against Corinthians. But then the bubble burst and they were relegated in 1929. A quite remarkable first nine years in the Football League. Another remarkable thing about their relegation is the fact that they only conceded 59 goals throughout the season and that, despite finishing bottom of the league was the lowest number of goals conceded in the division.

Things got worse a couple of years later when they were relegated again, to Division 3 (South). It got slightly better down there when they had their record victory in 1932/33, beating Thames FC 9-2. But then in the next season, just ten years after finishing as runners up in the First Division, they were finishing bottom of the Third and had to apply for re-election. They succeeded in that but by the time the war broke out, they were still a 3rd division team.

When the league resumed in 1946/47, Cardiff had somehow changed their fortunes around and were promoted as champions of Div 3 (S). And then under the management of Cyril Spiers, won promotion back to the First Division in 1951/52 after 23 years outside the top flight. They stayed for 5 years, went down, came up again in 1960 and went down again in 1962.

The 1960s saw the introduction of the European Cup Winners Cup and the winners of the Welsh Cup were eligible to take part. Despite their lowly second division status, they reached the semi finals of this competition in 1967/68. They played Hamburg and drew the first leg 1-1 away, with Norman Dean getting the goal. The second leg attracted 43,00 to Ninian Park. Dean scored again to put them 2-1 up on aggregate, but Franz-Josef Hönig equalised shortly afterwards. Brian Harris gave the Bluebirds the lead again in the 78th minute only for Hönig to score again. Then in the 88th minute, German international legend, Uwe Seeler, who would go on to knock England out of the World Cup in 1970, popped up with the winner to knock the Welsh boys out. This is still the furthest a Welsh club has ever gone in a European competition.

They reached the quarter finals in 1971 and played Real Madrid. They won the first leg 1-0 at Ninian Park in front of 47,000 spectators, with ex Town striker Brian Clark scoring the goal. They lost the second leg 0-2 though.

Relegation reared it's ugly head again in 1975 and they went down to Div 3, coming back up after just the one season. They went back down again in 1982 and then in 1986 they went down for the first time to Division 4. They yo-yoed between the bottom two divisions, culminating in 1996 with their lowest ever league finish, 22nd in the 4th tier (called Div Three then). Their European adventures came to an end as well. After winning the Welsh Cup on 22 occasions, the teams playing in the English FA Cup were banned from the competition by the FAW in 1995.

Sam Hammam became the new owner in 2000 and made Lennie Lawrence manager. Things slowly started to turn around. They won the 2003 Play Offs at the Millennium Stadium, beating QPR 1-0 with a goal from Andy Campbell in extra time to get them back into the 2nd tier for the first time in 18 years. Then in 2008, with Dave Jones now in charge, they reached the FA Cup Final for the first time since they won it in 1927. It wasn't to be this time though as they were beaten by Portsmouth 1-0.

After playing at Ninian Park for 99 years, they moved into the new Cardiff City Stadium in 2009. You can see from this picture how close the two were to each other, probably a few feet closer than our two stadiums. The old one has a housing estate on it now, as you can see from the photo at the top of the page.

Vincent Tan then became the major shareholder and appointed Malky Mackay as manager and they reached the League Cup Final in 2011. Their opponents were the mighty Liverpool. Cardiff were still in the Championship. Joe Mason opened the scoring in the first half to put the Bluebirds ahead, only for Martin Škrtel to equalise on the hour mark. It finished 1-1 after 90 mins and then Liverpool went ahead. Skipper Mark Hudson had been replaced on 99 minutes by Anthony Gerrard and Dirk Kuyt gave the Reds the lead soon after. However, with time running out, Ben Turner scored the equaliser for Cardiff from a corner and the match went to a penalty shoot out. Despite Tom Heaton saving from Steven Gerrard and Charlie Adam blazing his kick over the bar, by the time it got to the last of the Cardiff five, that numpty Gerrard had to score to keep the game alive. He missed.

The experience did them good though as in the next season, they won the Championship title and won promotion to the Premier League after an absence of 52 years from the top flight. It was only for one season though. Mackay was given the sack half way through the season and replaced by Ole Gunnar Solskjær, who took them down. He was replaced by Russell Slade in the next season and then in 2016, he was replaced by Neil Warnock. The old boy got them promoted, not through his usual Play Off route, they finished as runners up to Wolves and went up automatically.

That didn't last long and they were relegated with us at the end of the 2018/19 season. Last season they made it to the Play Offs. By now Neil Harris was in charge after Warnock left in November, they lost on aggregate to Fulham.

Head to Head



Town lead the Head to Head with 29 wins to Cardiff's 26 with 22 draws.

But we haven't won since 2003 when Andy Booth scored in a 1-0 win at the McAlpine. There have been 13 games since without us winning.

We had two very disappointing games against Cardiff last season, both ending in defeat. The first one was early on, the fourth match of the season, but we had already lost our Head Coach Jan Siewert. He had overseen three home defeats following on from relegation and so we toddled off down to South Wales with Cardiff legend, Mark Hudson as our caretaker. Joe Ralls gave the home side the lead just before half time and we all expected another soft performance in the second half, but no! Up popped Trevoh Chalobah to score his first (and only) Town goal. The brave Terriers held out and we were hoping against all odds that we might just get a winner. It was them who got it though with Junior Hoilett scoring two minutes from time.

They came up to ours in February and on a cold evening, despite us having 67% possession and 19 shots on goal, they came away with all three points and an easy 3-0 win. Their goals that night came from Josh Murphy, Will Vaulks and Callum Paterson.

We first started playing each other in the 1920s and as you can see from the History section above, we had a bit of a rivalry. The first two matches were in December 1921 and we didn't even score. It was goalless at Ninian Park and then they came up to Leeds Road on Christmas Eve and left with the points and a 1-0 win. We played them in the next season in a November double header and it was us this time with the upper hand as we beat them both times 1-0. Charlie Wilson scoring at Leeds Road and then Jack Byers with the goal down there.

The next season, 1923/24 was the one where we won the title, beating Cardiff on Goal Average. The two games came late on in the season. We beat them 2-0 at home in March with a couple of George Brown goals, but it was another tense goal less affair in Cardiff in April. We were top of the table after that match as Sunderland's challenge began to fade. By the time the final round of matches came around, Cardiff had taken advantage of our defeat away at Aston Villa in the penultimate match and moved into top spot. All they had to do was win at Birmingham. A George Cook double and another from Brown gave us a 3-0 win at home to Nottingham Forest. The Town fans awaited the result from St Andrews. It was good news. I've already mentioned that Len Davies missed the penalty, but it was a save from the Birmingham keeper Dan Tremelling after wing half Percy Barton had given away the spot kick by punching the ball off the line, in the days before this was a sending off offence. And so Cardiff drew 0-0 and only took one point. We went above them by virtue of winning 3-0. A 2-0 win wouldn't have been enough.

Unlikely Town hero!

As we all know, we won the title again in the next two seasons. Cardiff were still around for both of them and in 24/25 we drew both games. We also drew the first meeting in the thrice champions season and then beat them 2-1 away. The next season saw another draw at Leeds Road and a 0-2 defeat down there. But then in 1927/28 we had a couple of crazy games. This was the season that we finished as runners up to Everton and Cardiff came up here in October. They left with a good old walloping as our brave lads scored 8 for the first time in a FL match. We won the match 8-2 with a Bob Kelly hat trick, two from Johnny Dent, one each from Alex Jackson and Billy Smith and a Roy Goodall penalty. Then in February, after big wins against West Ham (5-2), Spurs (4-2) and Everton (4-1), we went to Ninian Park and got stuffed 4-0! Funny old game!

We followed that by drawing the two games in the next season as Cardiff got relegated. And that was the rivalry done with for 24 years. Cardiff had made it back to the First Division as we went down for the first time and met up again in 1953 when we won promotion back into the top flight. And we beat them at home 2-0 in the third game of the season to go top of the league, with goals from Jimmy Watson and Vic Metcalfe. They beat us 2-1 a week later down at theirs. We had three more seasons together in the top flight and then we got relegated. And so when we met at Leeds Road in Feb '56, it would be the last meeting of the two clubs at the top level for 62 years. Cardiff won it 2-1.

They came down in the next and so we met at the 2nd level for the first time in September '57 and Cardiff beat us again down at theirs. We had a few seasons together in the 60s, missing a couple when they went back up. We were apart again at the start of the 70s as we had gone and got ourselves promoted. We did the double over the Bluebirds in our promotion season, winning both matches 1-0. Jimmy Nicholson scored at home and a Brian Harris own goal gave us the points at theirs.

We met again in the 2nd division after we got relegated in 1972, but that was it for the 70s. The next time we shared a division was in the 80s. Cardiff had just been relegated to the 3rd division and they came to Leeds Road in October 1982. They brought their ruddy hooligans with them as well and I remember a big old scrap outside the Waggon & Horses and one of the Cardiff fans getting trampled by one of the police horses. He just got up and laughed it off.   Happy days!

Anyway, we won the game 4-0. Mark Lillis scored all four of them. What a game that was, much to the delight of a local butcher who was sponsoring him with a T-Bone steak for every goal he scored. We should try that now instead of pledging breakfasts for poor kids, we should buy big juicy steaks for our brave, under paid footy stars.

We went down to Cardiff for the return match in March. We had a minibus trip for a midweek game. Some of the lads had their wives with them and so decided that they didn't want to be in with the mob, so we all sat in the main stand. We'll be alright there. Wrong! When David Cowling equalised to make it 1-1, they were all over us, some climbing the wall from the paddock in front of the seats to hit us. Oh happy days!  

We both got promoted that season. We finished 3rd and they finished 2nd behind champions Portsmouth. So we met up again in the 2nd division in 83/84. We started the season well and by the time we went to Cardiff and lost 1-3, we were in 5th place. It was more of a struggle for the second half of the season though, but when Cardiff came up here in April, we beat them 4-0 again. No goals for Lillis this time though, but we did have a hat trick and it was from a centre back. Paul Jones it was, two of the three were penalties though. Daryl Pugh got the other.

Jones got another pen at Leeds Road against them as we beat them 2-1 in the following season, with Dale Tempest getting the other. Cardiff beat us 3-0 at theirs towards the back end of the season, but it wasn't enough to save them from relegation.

So it was another four years before we played each other again in the third tier. Only a couple of seasons, they got relegated to the 4th div. Along the way, we contributed to their down fall. Despite losing 2-3 at home, we went down to Ninian Park at the back end of the 1989/90 season and hammered them 5-1. And another Town player scored four against them. This time it was Craig Maskell, with Kieran O'Regan with the other. When they came back up, we did them again 5-1 at home in our first season in the MacAlpine Stadium. Five different goal scorers though in this one, Andy Booth, Tom Cowan, Ronnie Jepson, Paul Reid and Gary Crosby. They went down and we went up, so didn't play each other again until we had a couple of seasons together in the early 2000s.

There has only been one Cup meeting and that was in the League Cup 2nd round in 2011. And a right cracker of a game it was an' all in our first visit to the new Cardiff City Stadium. Gábor Gyepes opened the scoring and Jon Parkin made it two, with his only Cardiff goal that season before he came on loan to us. Then came an unbelievable turnaround. Jordan Rhodes pulled one back in the second half, Danny Ward equalised and then in the 88th minute Rhodes put us 3-2 up. Could we hold out for the win against a team who were by now in a higher division than us? Nope! Don Cowie grabbed an equaliser in the third minute of injury time to send the match into extra time. Craig Conway gave them the lead before Cowie rounded the night off with his second to finish the match at 5-3.

We got promoted that season and started off the new season on a Friday night, live on Sky Sports down in Cardiff. They were one of the favourites for promotion, having made it to the Play Off Final in the previous season and we did really well. It was 0-0 when the 4th official put his board up showing five minutes. Unfortunately in the first of those, up popped future Town skipper and caretaker manager Mark Hudson to burst our bubble. He would lift the Championship trophy at the end of the season.

They came straight back down though and won five out of six against us in the next three seasons. The last of them though was at the end of the 2016/17 season when we had already secured our place in the Play Offs. Neil Warnock was their manager now and we had David Wagner. Whatever you do, don't do anything stupid to jeopardise the Play Off campaign would've been what Wagz instructed the team as they went out onto the grass. It took Danny Ward just 20 minutes to forget all that as he came flying out of his area and got sent off. We were already one down to a Kenneth Zohore goal. Joel Coleman took over in goal and was then beaten twice by Joe Bennett as the visitors took a 3-0 win.

We won the Play Offs and Colin got Cardiff up in the next season and so we met up in the top flight for the first time in 62 years. And after all these classic matches I've just wrote about, what a terrible anti climax those Premier League games were, both ending in goal less draws. Jonathan Hogg got sent off in the home game and the one at theirs on January the 12th 2019 was particularly galling after the ref, Lee Mason, gave us a penalty and then changed his mind, in the season before VAR came in. Sadly, this was the last straw for Wagner after a series of shocking refereeing decisions and bad luck and yes, some poor play, he left the club by mutual consent the day after this.

Ye baldy headed twat!

So what's going on down at the Cardiff City Stadium? Managed nowadays by Neil Harris, the Millwall legend and all time leading goalscorer.

Born in Essex in 1997, he was a bit of a latecomer to the professional game, starting out with Maldon Town and Cambridge City, from where he joined Millwall as a 21 year old in 1998. He was an immediate hit with the fans there, winning Player of the Season in his first full one. They were a Division Two side then (3rd tier) and the goals scoring just kept on coming for him. That first season he scored 18, then 25 and then in 2000/01 he scored 28 goals as the Lions won the title.

But then he missed a large chunk of the first season in Division One (2nd tier) when he was diagnosed with testicular cancer. He had intensive treatment, including surgery and thankfully received the all clear some time later. This led to him setting up the charity the Neil Harris Everyman Appeal.

Back playing football, he wasn't as prolific in the Championship (as it now had been renamed), but he did play for the Lions in the 2004 FA Cup Final, which they lost to Man Utd. Manager Dennis Wise sent him out on loan to Cardiff in 2004. They wanted to keep him but instead he was sold to Nottingham Forest, who were in League One at the time. It didn't quite work out for him at the City Ground and he was loaned out to Gillingham and was almost loaned back to Millwall.

He did eventually return to the New Den though in 2007, when Forest released him. They were now also in League One now. At the time of his departure from Millwall a couple of years earlier, he was level with Teddy Sheringham as Millwall's all time leading league goals scorer with 93 and in the second match of his return he broke that in a 4-0 win against Rotherham.

Teddy still held the all goals record and it took Harris a while to overtake him as he had lost his place in the team to Lewis Grabban and Gary Alexander. He did get there eventually in 2009, in a match at Crewe, when he scored his 112th Millwall goal. Later that season he helped the Lions make it to the Play Offs where they beat the Skip Dwellers of Beeston 2-1 on aggregate and he scored the only goal of the first leg at the Den. They lost the final though to Scunthorpe Utd.

He scored against us in the league in the following season as they beat us 3-1 at the Den. And then we went down there for the Play Off semi final in May and he walked off to a standing ovation in the 89th minute when he was subbed and Town had submitted to defeat. He then played the full 90 at Wembley when they beat Swindon to get back into the Championship.

He had one injury hit season in the Championship before leaving in the summer to go play for Southend Utd, his hometown club, in League Two. He went away with 138 goals in his Millwall career, the club record. Injury forced his retirement in 2013 and he moved into coaching, firstly with Wrexham and then back to Millwall to coach the u21s. He had a couple of stints as caretaker when Steve Lomas and then Ian Holloway got the boot. They were on their way down to League One when the West Country Wazzock left and Harris almost kept them up with an upturn in form. Almost, but not quite. The board were impressed enough to give him the job full time.

His first full season in the hot seat got them back to Wembley for the Play Off Final. They beat Bradford City 4-2 on aggregate in the semis, but then lost 1-3 to Barnsley. They went up in the next campaign though, through the Play Offs, beating Billy Bantam again, 1-0 at Wembley after disposing of Scunny in the semis. He also led them to the FA Cup quarter finals that season, famously beating Premier League champions, Leicester City along the way.

But then in October 2019, he surprisingly resigned. They were 18th in the Championship and on a run of 8 games without a win. His legendary status at the club didn't stop fans giving him stick and in the end it looks like this got to him and he walked, with the blessing of the chairman. Even more surprising then was when six weeks later, he took over from Neil Warnock as manager of Cardiff. They were mid table, but by the end of the season, Harris had got them into the Play Offs with a 5th place finish. They lost to Fulham.

Who's in their squad then? He's one of our own, but now he's one of theirs, Alex Smithies is the number one goalkeeper these days. Known as a top penalty saver, his kicking was always a bit suspect when we had him. He's now regarded as one of the best ball playing goalkeepers in the Championship. His deputy is ex Charlton keeper Dillon Phillips. He was back up to Ben Hamer in his early Charlton career. They also have ex Newport goalie Joe Day.

Ex Town defender Sean Morrison is the club captain. He is joined in defence by Curtis Nelson, who signed from Oxford Utd last year, having previously played over 200 games for Plymouth Argyle. Joe Bennett, who scored a couple of goals against us in 2017 when we weren't trying because we'd already qualified for the Play Offs. He signed from Aston Villa in 2016. Croatian Filip Benković is on loan from Leicester. He was on loan at Bristol City last season. Jordi Osei-Tutu is on loan from Arsenal.

Sol Bamba is now 35 year old and has played in his native France for PSG, Scotland with Dunfermline and Hibs, Trabzonspor in Turkey, Italy with Palermo and in England for Leicester and the Beeston BellEnders. He was signed by Neil Warnock at Bellend Road and he made him his first signing when he got the job at Cardiff in 2016.

Joel Bagan is a 19 year old who has broken through to the first team this season. Greg Cunningham is an Irish defender who's coming back from a cruciate injury sustained while he was on loan at Blackburn last season.

In midfield they have Leandro Bacuna, who's brother Juninho Bacuna plays for us of course. The pair of them are internationals for Curaçao, which used to be known as the Dutch Antilles. They were both actually born in the Netherlands. Leandro is the older brother by six years and they both started out with their home town club Groningen. He was the first to come over to England, signing for Premier League Aston Villa. After four seasons there, he moved to Reading just after they had been beaten in the Play Off final of 2017 and then signed for Cardiff in the January window last year.

Welsh international Will Vaulks signed from Rotherham last year. Joe Ralls has been there for yonks and has over 200 games for the Bluebirds behind him. Josh Murphy played with his twin brother Jacob Murphy at Norwich. Jacob is now in the Prem with Newcastle, but Josh, having signed for Cardiff when they were in the PL, is now a Championship player.

Marlon Pack was captain over the other side of the Severn at Bristol City. He signed for Cardiff at the start of last season having made 283 appearances for the Robins. Canadian winger Junior Hoilett played for Blackburn and QPR before joining Cardiff in 2016. Gavin Whyte is a Northern Ireland international, who got arrested for exposing himself last year when he was an Oxford Utd player (insert shocking tackle joke here).

Two players in the squad are on loan from Liverpool. They are winger Sheyi Ojo, who spent last season in Scotland, on loan at Rangers. And Harry Wilson, who was on loan in the Prem at Bournemouth last season. He's 23 years old now but in 2013 became the youngest player to play for Wales, beating the record set by Gareth Bale. Earlier this season, he finally made his Liverpool debut in the League Cup match against Arsenal. It finished 0-0 and he was one of the players who missed in the penalty shoot out. As a punishment, Jürgen Klopp sent him to Cardiff.

Up top, they have another Welsh international in big lad, Kieffer Moore. He did the rounds of the non leagues and lower end Football Leagues before landing in the Championship with Ipswich Town. He made his debut for them at the John Smith's when we beat them 2-0 in January 2017. He then went to Rotherham and then Barnsley before going last season to Wigan. He scored twice as the Latics beat Hull City 8-0, but then when they got relegated, he signed for Cardiff in August. Munich born striker Robert Glatzel, signed from FC Heidenheim at the start of last season and scored 8 goals. Swansea born striker Mark Harris scored his first goal for Cardiff on Saturday. He's 21 years old and has been out on loan at Newport, Port Vale and Wrexham.

Kieeeeeeef!!

Saturday's line up at home to Luton:
12 Smithies
7 Bacuna
4 Morrison
16 Nelson
3 Bennett
23 H Wilson
8 Ralls
6 Vaulks
27 Ojo
29 M Harris
10 Moore

Substitutes:
1 Phillips
9 Glatzel
11 Murphy
13 Benkovic
20 Whyte
21 Pack
22 Bamba
32 Bagan
33 Hoilett


Club connections: Well there's a couple of ex Town players in the current Cardiff squad in Alex Smithies and Sean Morrison. Our very own Fraizer Campbell used to play for them and of course we signed Danny Ward from Cardiff in the summer.

Alex of course is a Town legend, not only saving penalties in the 2012 Play Off Final against Sheffield Utd, but also scoring the final one to put pressure on Steve Simonsen to blast his own kick into deep space. He came through our Academy and eventually broke into the first team and replaced Matt Glennon in the number 1 shirt. He played 274 times for us until he was sold to QPR after one match of the 2015/16 season. After a couple of season's there, winning Player of the Season in his last year, he went and joined Premier League Cardiff City but never got a game in the PL, finally making his Bluebird debut when they were back in the Championship last season.

Sean and Danny were team mates of Alex in our Play Off win in 2012. Sean was on loan from Reading who were in the Premier League then. He had been on loan in the season before, but Lee Clark never played him, so Reading recalled him. When he returned back to us, he made a total of 22 appearances and was the last of our outfield players to score in the shoot out. He went back to Reading afterwards and played in the PL for them and left for Cardiff in 2014. He became club captain in 2015, leading them up to the PL in 2018. He's now made 250+ appearances in a Cardiff shirt.

Danny had been subbed off before the shoot out came. His replacement was Alan Lee, who missed one. In total he played 130 games for us, scoring 17 times in his first stint. He left us for Rotherham in 2015, coming back and scoring against us. Then it was down to Cardiff, scoring 16 times in 62 games for them over three seasons, before coming back to us.

Fraizer was born in Huddersfield, but it took him a long time to sign for us. He opted to join Man Utd's Academy instead of ours and he played for clubs in the top leagues before he found his way back here. Whilst at Old Trafford he went to Royal Antwerp, Hull and Spurs on loan. Then signed for Sunderland, who were still in the PL. While he was at Sunderland, he gained his one and only England cap, coming on as a sub against the Netherlands.

He signed for Cardiff in 2013 scoring the winner on his debut against Leeds Urinals. He helped the Bluebirds win the title that season and started the next, in the Premier League, he scored twice as they beat Man City 3-2 in the 2nd game of the season. But following relegation, he left for Crystal Palace, then back to Hull and finally his boyhood dream came true when he joined the Greatest Team In Football The World Has Ever Seen early on last season, the last signing of the Jan Siewert era.

Jazz Richards was released by Cardiff at the end of last season and hasn't yet got himself a new club. He came on loan to us from Swansea in 2013 and didn't look that good, but then again, he didn't look awful. Which is probably why throughout his career he never became first choice. The most games he played in one season was the 26 he played in his first season as a Cardiff player and having now reached the age of 29, he still only has 168 professional matches behind him.

By contrast, one of his rivals for the right back positions at Cardiff, Lee Peltier has almost 500 games under his belt. His tally has slowed down slightly now he's joined West Brom, where he's still to feature in the Premier League. He played 103 games for us and 163 for Cardiff. He started his career at Liverpool, making his debut in the League Cup and then turning out in a Champions League dead rubber against Galatasaray. They sold him to Yeovil, who then sold him on to us in 2009. He went to Leicester from us, then to Leeds and then Nottingham Forest on loan.

Then out of the blue, he was back with us. Mark Robins signed him in June 2014 and made him captain. He proudly led the team out for the opening day of the season...….and we got thumped 4-0 by Bournemouth. Robins left, Chris Powell came in and promptly gave the right back slot to Tommy Smith. Pelts was on his bike in the January window, down to Cardiff to play for his old Yeovil boss, Russell Slade.

He helped Cardiff win promotion to the Premier League, making 30 appearances in the promotion push, but then deja vu struck. In the first game of the next season, Cardiff got thumped by Bournemouth and Pelts got dropped. He moved to WBA in January this year but was released without playing a game, in the summer. Slaven Bilić must've had a change of mind though and re-signed him and gave him his debut in the League Cup win over Harrogate.

Anthony Pilkington now plays in India, having been released by Wigan at the end of last season. He came to us as a fresh faced 20 year old from Stockport County and played the same couple of seasons for us as Pelts did. County were in the same division as us back then. They'd just come up via the Play Offs and Pilks scored one of the goals in the 3-2 win against Rochdale at Wembley. He had two unsuccessful Play Off campaigns with us, but we won't go over all that again. He was one of the best players to pull on a Town shirt in the 2010's decade and we got £3m for him when Premier League Norwich took him away.

He had three seasons in the Prem with them, before moving on to Cardiff in the Championship. He won promotion with them but was sold to Wigan before he got to play at the top level in a Bluebirds shirt. For us he played 103 times, scoring 21 goals. For Cardiff, he scored 23 goals in 111 appearances.

Mark Hudson skippered both teams in successful promotion campaigns to the Premier League. After playing for Fulham, Oldham, Crystal Palace and Charlton, he arrived in Cardiff in the summer of 2009. Manager Dave Jones immediately made him club captain and he formed a centre back partnership with Anthony Gerrard, who would also make the trip up to Huddersfield later in his career. In 2012, Hudson captained the team at Wembley in the League Cup Final when they lost on penalties against Liverpool, daft Anthony missing the crucial one. They also made it to the Play Offs that season, but got beat in the semis by West Ham.

Town had gone up and played away at Cardiff on the opening night of the new season, when Huddy went and scored the winner for them in injury time. They won the Championship that season, but in the PL, he was out of favour, spending most of the season on the bench. New manager Ole Gunnar Solskjær sold him to us just after the start of the 14/15 season and he took over the captaincy from the aforementioned Peltier. He was an inspirational signing and became a Town legend by scoring the first of our goals when we beat the Champions of Europe 4-1 at Bellend Road in 2016. Then of course, he was our club captain when we won promotion to the PL in the next season. David Wagner then invited him into the coaching team.

If you watched the video in the History section, you will have seen Brian Clark scoring one of the most famous goal in Cardiff's history when he scored against Real Madrid in the European Cup Winners Cup. He had been at Town for a couple of seasons in the 60s, eventually losing his place to the emerging talent of Frank Worthington. He began his career with Bristol City, playing there for 7 years and scoring 83 goals. He came to Town in '67 in exchange for Johnny Quigley and scored on his debut, in a defeat at Rotherham. He left for Cardiff in '68 and scored twice on his debut there as the Bluebirds beat Derby County. He formed a partnership with John Toshack, who had left for Liverpool by the time Brian scored his winner against Madrid. He scored 75 times for Cardiff, being top scorer for three years. He then went to Bournemouth, Millwall, back to Cardiff for one season and then finished off at Newport County. His career goal total was 217, only 11 of them in the bright blue n white of Huddersfield Town. He died in 2010 of Lewy body dementia at the age of 67.

Neil Warnock managed both clubs and got them to the Premier League. He took with him ex Town keeper, the Cat, Kevin Blackwell and Town legend Rocket Ronnie Jepson.

The scorer of the greatest goal scored at the John McAlpharm Stadium, Tony Carss played for Cardiff in 97/98 and for us between 2003 and 2006, being part of our Play Off winning team in 2004.

Premier League winner, Danny Drinkwater played for both clubs on loan from Man Utd before he went on to glory with Leicester City.

Alan Lee scored a boat load of goals for Rotherham and so Lennie Lawrence forked out £850,000 for him to go to Cardiff in 2003. He had three seasons there, much of it on the treatment table and only scored ten goals for them. He went to Ipswich after that and got back on the score sheet again, including the famous goal that relegated Leeds Urinals. He then went to Crystal Palace and then came to us and became a bit of a cult hero. He scored 12 goals for us, but it took him ages to get off the mark and his first one was a memorable one, scoring a bullet header at the Emirates to put us level in the FA Cup against Arsenal.

Goalkeepers Martyn Margetson and Andy Dibble played for both us and Cardiff and both played for Man City at the same time as rivals for the gloves. Andy came on loan from Luton, who were in Division One then, in 1987 and played 5 games for us. He started his career at Cardiff, making his debut as a 17 year old. He later moved to Man City and eventually lost his place when young Margetson broke through. Martyn came to us in 1999 as back up for Nico Vaesen. When Nico left, he took over and played the season where we got to the Play Offs and got beat by Brentford. After playing for us, he went to Cardiff. And he stayed there as goalkeeping coach. He's now coaching up the M4 at Swansea and also is the goalkeeping coach for the England national team. How did he get that job? Sam Allardyce appointed him in the job during his one match reign as England boss.

Rob Page recently took charge of the Wales international side when Ryan Giggs had been a naughty boy. He played 41 times for his country and played 9 times for Cardiff City in the 2004/05 season. He then went to Coventry before ending up at ours. He played 20 games for us in 2007/08 and impressed us all. We were hoping for him to get a permanent deal, but Stan Ternent got the managers job and didn't fancy him and so he upped and left for Chesterfield.

Steve Jenkins came to us in 1995 from Swansea City, having played in their team that beat us on penalties in the Autoglass Trophy final (FL Trophy) the year before. He stayed with us for 7 years, becoming club captain. He played over 250 times for us and before that over 150 times for the Swans. Which may not have gone down well when he signed for Cardiff when he left us in 2003. He only made 4 appearances for the Bluebirds before moving on again, this time to Notts County. He's now assistant manager to Peter Beadle at National League club Barnet.


Others who have played for both include Des Hamilton (10 games for us, 25 for them), Emyr Huws (Town 30 apps, Cardiff 3), Jon Parkin (3 for us, 5 for them) and Scott Malone who played for us in the PL 22 times and 54 games for Cardiff in the Championship.

Cardiff in popular culture: It's the capital of Wales and in Welsh it's name is Caerdydd. It was just a small town in the 19th century, but became the main port for coal exports and grew from then on. Became a city in 1905 and the football team became Cardiff City soon after. But of course, all that coal and stuff got shut down and the whole bay area has been redeveloped and the city is now one of Britain's top tourist destinations.

And them there tourists will be flocking to the city in September every year because it is the home of The Great British Cheese Festival, having won the rights to hold it in 2008 from Cheltenham. I say "won". I think that means they gave the Cheese Board a bigger bribe than the people in the beautiful state of Glossestershire. It's held in the grounds of Cardiff Castle on a weekend in the back end of September.

Cardiff is also the place where Doctor Who is filmed, being made there by BBC Wales since the Doctor's relaunch in 2005. So that's one Huddersfield lass, Jodie Whittaker who's doing a grand job down there. Can our big brave football team beat some scary Welsh monsters this week?

Also filmed there was Gavin & Stacey and nowadays the brilliant boffins quiz Only Connect, hosted by Victoria Coren-Mitchell.

Huddersfield Town had a famous Play Off victory in Cardiff. That was at the Millennium Stadium in 2004 when we beat Mansfield Town in a penalty shoot out.

There are loads of entertainers from Cardiff. Bands like Amen Corner, Catatonia, Super Furry Animals and the Hot Puppies. Then of course we have the legend that is Shakin' Stevens, Dame Shirley Bassey and young classical singer and tabloid darling Charlotte Church. Add to that Griff Rhys Jones, Honeysuckle Weeks, Stan Stennett and Gethin Jones, you can say that Cardiff is full of talent.

The most famous one though has to be the great, the magnificent, the ingenious, the remarkable, the illustrious, Two Ton Tessie O'Shea!!!!

As for celebrity fans, it's a great big list of who's nobody. Most of them I've never heard of and the ones I do know are dead. That just leaves us with the fictional. That'll be Dave Coaches from Gavin & Stacey, who revealed in series 3 that he was a Cardiff supporter.

"Y'aright, Sugar Tits?"

'ow to get theere an' wheere to sup: Still going to have to stick with the old telly box for this one.

Other Championship matches this week:

Tuesday:
Birmingham City v Barnsley
AFC Bournemouth v Preston North End
Derby County v Coventry City
Queens Park Rangers v Bristol City
Rotherham United v Brentford

Wednesday:
Blackburn Rovers v Millwall
Luton Town v Norwich City
Middlesbrough v Swansea City
Nottingham Forest v Watford
Sheffield Wednesday v Reading
Wycombe Wanderers v Stoke City


Recent form - last 6 matches:

Town 3-2 Boro
Wycombe 0-0 Town
Stoke 4-3 Town
Town 1-1 Luton
Town 1-2 Bristol C.
Millwall 0-3 Town

Cardiff 4-0 Luton
Coventry 1-0 Cardiff
Millwall 1-1 Cardiff
Cardiff 0-1 Bristol C.
Cardiff 3-0 Barnsley
QPR 3-2 Cardiff


Town are 13th with 18 points, Cardiff are in 14th with 17.

Leading scorers:
'Udders:
Josh Koroma (4)
Carel Eiting (3)
Frazier Campbell (3)
Isaac Mbenza (2)

Caerdydd:
Kieffer Moore (5)
Joe Ralls (3)
Sheyi Ojo (3)
Harold Wilson (2)


December the 1st down the ages: How did we get on in previous matches played on this date? Not very good to be honest. Just 4 wins out of 18. And only two league wins. Even in 1923/24 when we won the league title for the first time, we lost at Roker Park on this date. Even the all conquering side of 1979/80 lost at home to Hereford on this date.



1913: Stockport County (a) Div 2, drew 0-0  
1917: Sheffield Utd (h) Wartime League, WON 3-1 (T.Hall 2, Thomas Elliott)
1923: Sunderland (a) Div 1, lost 1-2 (Charlie Wilson)
1928: Bury (a) Div 1, lost 1-2 (Bob Kelly)
1934: Blackburn Rovers (a) Div 1, lost 2-4 (Alf Lythgoe, Alf Young)
1945: Liverpool (a) Wartime League North, lost 1-4 (Laurie Hughes og)
1951: Charlton Athletic (a) Div 1, lost 0-4
1956: Blackburn Rovers (a) Div 2, lost 0-2
1962: Stoke City (a) Div 2, lost 1-2 (Derek Stokes)
1973: Southport (a) Div 3, drew 0-0
1979: Hereford Utd (h) Div 4, lost 0-1
1984: Sheffield Utd (a) Div 2, WON 2-0 (Steve Doyle, Dale Tempest)
1987: Swindon Town (a) Div 2, lost 1-4 (Graham Cooper)
2001: Cambridge Utd (h) Div Two (3rd tier) WON 2-1 (Chris Hay, Andy Booth)
2007: Grimsby Town (h) FA Cup rd 2, WON 3-0 (Phil Jevons 2, Luke Beckett)
2009: Tranmere Rovers (h) Div One (3rd tier), drew 3-3 (Lee Novak, Michael Collins, Antony Kay)
2012: Leeds Utd (h) Championship, lost 2-4 (Chris Atkinson, Adam Clayton pen)
2018: Brighton (h) Premier League, lost 1-2 (Zanka)





Quiz time:

1. Who is Cardiff's all time leading goal scorer?
   
2. Who is Millwall's all time leading goal scorer?
   
3. Who scored for Town at Cardiff last season?
   
4. Whereabouts in Cardiff is the Great British Cheese Festival held?
   
5. What year did Cardiff win the FA Cup?
   
6. Which Town player scored 4 goals in a game against Cardiff in the 1982/83 season?
   
7. Which Town player scored 4 goals in a game against Cardiff in the 1989/90 season?
   
8. Who did Town sign Anthony Pilkington from?
   
9. Which ex Town goalkeeper is now England's goalkeepers coach?
   
10. Who scored the winner for Cardiff against us in the opening match of 2012/13?
    

[jjamez]

Good job they won on Saturday and comfortably at that, Harris was under real pressure before that and had they lost it would have been a must win for him on Tuesday. Maybe there won't be as much urgency from them now.

Or maybe they've turned the corner...

[theo_luddite]

Maybe they have, maybe they haven't - it was only their 2nd win in the last 8 games. Average home points per game 1.14, Town average away points per game 1.14. Yet another 0-0 draw on the cards then?

---

1. Who is Cardiff's all time leading goal scorer? Len Davies according to your bit in red up the page
2. Who is Millwall's all time leading goal scorer? - that would be a certain Neil Harris, whatever happened to him then? Oh, that Neil Harris

[talkSAFT]

Absolutely bostin' article, your Lordship.
(I'd buy your book).

[Lord Snooty]

---

Both correct, theo.

---

Absolutely bostin' article, your Lordship.    
(I'd buy your book).

Thanks, talkSAFT.

[theo_luddite]

Don't think you'll mind this intrusion in your thread Snoots

Message from Sue Beaumont

May I be the 94th person on this board to wish her a Happy Retirement.

---

Town first out of the hat, home to Plymouth FA Cup 3rd Rd.

[Lord Snooty]

Just noticed we've an early kick off again tonight. Don't be late. It starts at seven.

[Amelia Chaffinch]

[Lord Snooty]

Carlos Corberán is without Pipa (hamstring), @TommyElph4 (knee), Juninho Bacuna (hamstring), @pritch_93 (ankle), @the_stears (hamstring) and @rcrichlow_ (groin).

[jjamez]

Not sure how I feel about town's line-up