[Lord Snooty]

Not the best birthday for young Romoney. He's just tweeted that he's had his car written off and his holiday cancelled.

[theo_luddite]

That's an ouch

[Lord Snooty]

June 4:

Another day, another Ray Wilson international cap. This was the 29th of the 30 caps he got as a player for Town and was the second game for the Three Lions in the mini tournament out in Brazil.

Having been hammered 5-1 in the game with Brazil, Alf Ramsey brought Gordon Banks in to replace Blackpool's Tony Waiters in goal, but Ray kept his place at left back in this match against Portugal on this day in 1964 at the Estádio do Pacaembu in Sao Paulo. They had one of the stars of the game in the 60s in their side. Having faced Pele in the last game, Ray was now up against Eusébio.

The Portuguese took the lead just before half time through Fernando Peres and Roger Hunt equalised just after the break and the match finished as a one all draw.

On this date in 1971, we had the final group game of the Anglo/Italian Cup. Town had beaten Sampdoria both home and away but had lost at home to Bologna. This final game of the competition for Town was against the spaghetti boys at the Stadio Communale, with Town going into it in prime position in the English table.

But Francesco Rizzo, who had played for Italy in the 1966 World Cup, was the scorer of the game's only goal, to knock the Terriers out. That wasn't how the game went though, with Town frustratingly missing chance after chance. Les Chapman, Frank Worthington, Mick Barry and Trevor Cherry should all have scored and Ian Greaves commented afterwards that this was one of the best performances under his management, despite the result.

So the players went off for the summer break in confident mood for the up coming season. Sadly that confidence was to be drained as the Town got relegated from Division One.

As for Bologna, they played Blackpool in the Final and it was the Tangerines who won it 2-1.

Born on this date in 1981 was Gary Taylor-Fletcher. He was born in Widnes and is 41 today. He of course, scored both for and against us in the Play Offs. He scored for Lincoln against us in 2004 and then for us against Barnsley in 2006.

His best goal for us was probably the one that was marked down as the 500,000th ever Football League goal. He scored this against Rotherham Utd in August 2006, but who the hell was counting half a million goals?

GTF never won promotion with us or Lincoln, but he did later on with both Blackpool and Leicester. One player who did win promotion with us and is also having a birthday today is Rajiv van La Parra, the dangerous Dutch winger that we got from Wolves and helped the Town win promotion in 2017.

He was born in Rotterdam in 1991 and is 31 today. His first Town goal was against his old Wolverhampton colleagues in the early days of 2016/17 and as he celebrated in front of their fans at the away end of the JSS, they all heartily congratulated him.

He was a bit marmite when playing for us. Some fans loved his trickery and skill, whilst others couldn't stand the lazy so n so.

Whatever we all thought, he was an important cog in the David Wagner squad, but after relegation to the Championship, he was sold in the half time raffle at Luton Town awaaaaay, with Red Star Belgrade winning the prize.

He didn't last long there and is now playing in the Bundesliga 2nd Division for the Würzburger Kickers.

So which side of the marmite fence do you fall on? Van La Parra, footballing genius or waste of space?

[theo_luddite]

I never considered VLP lazy, it was just that he'd run the ball out of defence, that was his good part, then he'd fall over/dive trying to win a free kick instead of looking for a pass. Every ref knew it and never gave him a thing. A frustrating waste of space in the oppo's half rather than a lazy waste of space in my opinion. If he was a genius he'd still be employed somewhere else and have played way more than a few slack handfuls of games in the past 4-5 seasons. His 18 games in Greece this season for a team that wears Town's colours (or nearly) Apollon Smyrnis F.C. are almost as many as from the previous seasons for Boro, on loan from Town, Red Star Belgrade, UD Logroñés and Würzburger Kickers combined.

---

By the way, you won't be surprised to know he's no longer playing in Greece

[Lord Snooty]

June 5:

On this date in 1963, Ray Wilson of 2nd Division Huddersfield Town played another game for England. This one was away at Switzerland, a friendly game that the Swiss took to be a bit too friendly, letting the English leave with an 8-1 victory.

Bobby Charlton scored a hat trick in the St. Jakob-Park in Basle, where England had played a couple of matches in the 1954 World Cup. West Ham's Johnny Byrne got a couple of goals, Bryan Douglas of Blackburn got one, as did Tony Kay of Everton in his only game for the country. Liverpool's Jimmy Melia, who later on in life took Brighton to the FA Cup Final, scored one as well.

This was Ray's 21st cap, of the 30 he got whilst playing for Town.

On this date in 1913, one of Ireland's greatest footballers was born, in Magherafelt. He was Peter Doherty, who played for Huddersfield Town after the 2nd World War between 1946 and 49.

Before the war, he had won the league title with Manchester City in his first season after transferring there from Blackpool. That was City's first league title, by which time Town had won three.

When war broke out, he joined the RAF, but kept his registration with City, playing for them throughout the hostilities, as well as guesting for several other clubs. During this time, due to travel restrictions, players used to often turn out for the team closest to where they were based. One of the clubs he guested for was Derby County and he signed on for them after the war, winning the FA Cup with them, their only Cup triumph. Peter scored one of the goals in extra time as the Rams beat Charlton Athletic 4-1.

A dispute with the Derby directors (they've had some right muppets over the years) led him to moving away to join Huddersfield Town in 1946, signed by David Steele for a massive fee of £9,000. But he fitted right in and at the time, Town had one of the most feared forward lines in the land, with Jimmy Glazzard, Vic Metcalfe, Albert Bateman and Alf Wittingham alongside him. Town should've been pushing for honours but somehow struggled to do so.

Doherty was our leading scorer in his final two seasons and totalled 36 before leaving to become player/manager at Doncaster Rovers. Over his career, he scored over 200 goals, despite losing six seasons during the peak of his career to the war.

As a Town player, he gained four caps for Ireland. They were just one team for the whole island then, until Northern Ireland got their own team in 1954, by which time Peter was manager and took them to the 1958 World Cup where they reached the quarter finals.

It is said that he is the greatest Irish footballer ever to play for the country and that list includes the likes of George Best, Ian Dowie and Oliver Norwood. There are some that say he was one of the best to turn out for the Town as well. And that is a phenomenal list of great players.

[Lord Snooty]

June 6:

Sadly today marks the last international played for England as a Huddersfield Town player by Ray Wilson before he transferred to Everton. It was also the last time any Huddersfield Town player represented the club in a full England international

It was the 30th of the 63 caps he gained in his career and as was now 29 years old, it would seem that the best of his career was behind him. Not so. As we all know, in a couple of years from this match, he would win a World Cup winners medal with England at Wembley.

This match against Argentina, played on this date in 1964 was the last game in the mini tournament in Brazil and was played at the Maracanã in Rio. The Argies won it 1-0 to complete three victories out of three and win the tournament.

Alf Ramsey still hadn't got his line up fixed and only four players in this match would play in the Final in 1966. As well as Ray, there was Gordon Banks, Bobby Moore and Bobby Charlton.

Today's Town birthday is Anthony Pilkington. He was born in Blackburn in 1988 on this date and is 34 today.

We stole him from a hard up Stockport County for an undisclosed fee in January 2009 and in the two and a half seasons he had with us, he helped us twice reach the Play Offs. Sadly, he never made it to the 2011 final as he had broken his leg in March and by the time the next season started, we'd flogged him to Norwich for three million squid. He became a star for them in the Premier League.

He's now looking for a new club, having been released by Fleetwood Town.

[Lord Snooty]

June 7:

On this date in 1962, Ray Wilson of 2nd Division Huddersfield Town played in the 1962 World Cup for England. This was the third group game, the final one and all England needed to do to progress was get one point.

As with all the Group 4 matches, this was played at the Estadio El Teniente in Rancagua, Chile. Hungary had qualified and an England defeat would see Argentina through, after they drew 0-0 with the Hungarians the day before. This was in the days before all final group matches had to be played at the same time.

So a point was all that was needed and that's just what they got with Ray and his fellow defenders keeping a clean sheet in a goal less draw.

Should Walter Winterbottom select Ray for the quarter final match, it will be against Brazil on the 10th of June.

A former Town manager was born on this date in 1949. Lou Macari, born in Edinburgh and is 73 today. His time at Town was the end of his football career, coming firstly as assistant to Steve Bruce. When the flat nosed f*ckwit got sacked, it was Lou who took over with the team at the bottom of the 2nd Division or whatever it was called then. He tried but couldn't stop relegation, but did get us to the 3rd Division Play Offs in the next season.

He also got us to the area final of the LDV Vans Trophy, but we lost that to Blackpool and then the Play Off against Brentford. And despite all these near misses, the club was on it's arse. We didn't know at the time but it came out later that Lou was financing coaches and hotels for the away trips out of his own money.

How did the board repay such generosity? They sacked him and replaced him with Mick Wadsworth. 

So Lou finished with football, went back to Stoke, where he'd had two spells as manager. He'd had his fair share of tragedy in his life, his mother and then one of his three sons, committed suicide. And so Lou worked with Stoke-on-Trent council to set up The Macari Centre. This was a home for the homeless and during the Covid pandemic, he moved it all into a brand new warehouse.

What a nice bloke.

If you want to read a bit more of Lou's great work, have a click here.....

http://macari-foundation.co.uk/  

[Lord Snooty]

June 8:

On this date in 1942, the Second World War was about half way through. The Battle of Midway had just finished and the Japanese attacks on Sydney Harbour were just starting. And the longest reign for a manager of Huddersfield Town was about to end.

That was Clem Stephenson, who had been manager since May 1929, so just over 13 years. He had of course, been at the club even longer than that, having signed on as a player in August 1920, one of the first signings for Herbert Chapman and just a few weeks after he had played against Town for Aston Villa in the FA Cup Final.

He won the Cup and became a thrice champion as a player, but when Jack Chaplin stepped down as Town manager, Clem was the man to take over, having just hung up his boots at the age of 39.

In his first season as Town boss, he got the team to the FA Cup Final of 1930 against Arsenal at Wembley. He was in charge of the club for the whole of the 1930s and although we didn't win the league again, some club records were set in this decade that still stand today. On the 13th of December 1930, Clem's Town team beat Blackpool 10-1 at Leeds Road with George McLean scoring 4 and Joe Robson 3, with Bob Kelly, Jimmy Smailes and Harry Davies getting the others.

The crowd for this momentous event was only 11,932 which was possibly a reflection of the dark economic times the country was going through. Town finished 5th that season and went one place higher in the next. The following season, we finished 4th as Arsenal took the title. There was the record attendance at Leeds Road this year as we played Arsenal in the Cup with 67,037 turning up to see the Gunners win 1-0.

Arsenal retained the title in 33/34 as Clem led Town to be runners up. We had another slip down to 15th for the next season before rallying once more to finish 3rd in 35/36.

In 1938, Clem led Town to our fifth and, to date, final FA Cup Final. He's the only one involved in all five of our FA Cup Finals, albeit for the opposition in the first one.

He continued as manager when war broke out again and by the time he resigned on this date in 1942 to be replaced by Ted Magner he had taken Town to two FA Cup Finals, finished runners up in the league and were consistently in the top half of the top league throughout his time there. He managed the team in 556 matches, winning 235 of them.

Here's a picture of the 1935/36 squad with Clem the manager on the right side of the front row.

[Lord Snooty]

June 9:

Our young Welsh winger has a birthday today. No not Sorba Thomas, one even younger than him. It's Patrick Jones, who was born in that small village in the valleys called Stockport ( ) in 2003 and is 19 today. But if he's called Jones, he must be Welsh, yes?

Anyway, he played for his local team in North Wales, Ruthin Town and then Bala Town before joining Wrexham in 2017. After a couple of years there, he joined the Academy at Huddersfield, working his way up to the fringes of the first team squad, which culminated in an FA Cup debut in that behind closed doors game at home to Plymouth in January 2021. He almost scored after 4 minutes, but his shot was parried away for a corner. Romoney Crichlow then scored from the resulting set piece.

He kept his place for the next couple of first team games, making sub appearances in the Championship against Watford and Millwall as a 17 year old, before going back to the B team and getting a long term injury.

He has played at u17 level for his country.

On this date in 2018, Aaron Mooy of Premier League side, Huddersfield Town, played for Australia in an international warm up game for the up coming World Cup.

It was in Budapest against Hungary and the Aussies warmed up well by beating the Hungarians 2-1 with a late winner. And that's another Town connection, because the winner was an own goal from an ex HTFC player. That was Tamas Kadar, who came on loan to us from Newcastle in 2011, but got injured in his second game for us and was sent back broken.

He had worked his way up to be the captain of his country by this stage of his career, but his unfortunate own goal came in the 2nd minute of injury time and handed the Aussies the game, this after the Hungarians had equalised in the 88th minute.

Baldy old Mooy played the whole game, just a week before the Socceroos opening fixture in a week's time against France.

[Lord Snooty]

June 10:

On this date in 1962, Ray Wilson of 2nd Division Huddersfield Town played another game in the Chile 62 World Cup. We had now reached the quarter final stage and the opponents were Brazil at the Estadio Sausalito in Viña del Mar.

It was the end of the competition for the English team though, being beaten 3-1 by the Brazilians. They were up against one of the greatest players of the game, the little bird, Garrincha. He scored twice to beat Walter Winterbottom and his team, his first coming in the 31st minute. Gerry Hitchens, the former Cardiff and Aston Villa centre forward, scored an equaliser seven minutes later. He was by this time an Inter Milan player and so became the first England player currently playing for a foreign team, to score for England at a World Cup.

Vava scored for Brazil soon after half time and Garrincha made it 3-1 just before the hour. The thing that the game is most remembered for was the stray dog that came on and ran around the pitch, pictured here chasing our Ray. Jimmy Greaves eventually caught the little intruder and got peed on.

Greavsie, always good for a laugh, remarked that it helped his game because he stank so much that none of the Brazilians would go near him.

So England were out and this was the last time that Huddersfield Town were represented at a World Cup until 2018 when we had four players in it.

Before we finish this section, I know you're all wondering what happened to the dog. Well, Garrincha took him and adopted him. I'nt that nice! 

A player who played for England in a previous World Cup whilst representing the Town was Bill McGarry. He played a couple of games in the 1954 World Cup and was born on this date in Smoke-on-Stench in 1927.

He played right half, signing for us in 1951 from Port Vale and when he left for Bournemouth, ten years later, he had played 381 times for the club. That now has him standing at 9th= in our all time appearances list, level with Steve Smith.

He was an ever present in the famous back line of 1952/53 when the entire defence played every game. They were Laurie Kelly, Don McEvoy, Len Quested, Ron Staniforth, and goalkeeper Jack Wheeler, alongside Bill, something that has never been done before or since. He was an ever present again in the next season as Town finished 3rd in Division One behind champions Wolverhampton Wanderers.

And it was with Wolves that he became successful as a manager. Before that though, he won the 2nd Division title for Ipswich Town in 67/68. Then in 1971, won Wolves the Texaco Cup (a competition involving sides from England, Scotland, and Ireland that had not qualified for Europe), beating Heart of Midlothian in the Final.

The next season he got them to the 1972 UEFA Cup Final, an all English affair, which they lost to Tottenham Hotspur. But then finally in 1974, he got the Wolves some proper silverware, winning the League Cup by beating Manchester City 2-1 at Wembley.

Later on, he managed Saudi Arabia and Newcastle Utd (way before the two were merged  ), then Zambia and finished his career back at Wolves before retirement.

He died in South Africa in 2005, aged 77.

Not done yet, we have a couple more birthdays. Lee Fowler was born on this date in 1983 and is 39 today. He was born in Cardiff and it was in his home city where he found fame in the blue n white of Huddersfield Town, scoring the winning penalty in the 2004 Play Off Final shoot out at the Millennium Stadium.

And Jacob Butterfield, born in Bradford in 1990 and is 32 today. He only had one and a bit seasons with us, but won the Player of the Season award for 2014/15.

He played for St Johnstone at the back end of last season. Not sure if he's still there though.

And we finish today with an obituary. the greatest goalscorer in Huddersfield Town history, George Brown died on this date in Birmingham in 1948, after a short illness. He was only 44.

In his time at Town he won the league title three times, won an FA Cup runners up medal and had 8 caps for England, scoring 5 goals. when he left to join Villa in 1929, he was and still is, our all time record goal scorer with 159. His league goals tally was 142, which he has since been joined on that figure by Jimmy Glazzard.

He was born in 1903, on June 22nd. I'll write a bit more on him then.