[Lord Snooty]

Huddersfield Town v Sheffield United
The Sky Bet Championship
Thursday May the 4th - 19:45 ko
at the John Smith's Stadium

Huddersfield Town welcome already promoted Sheffield United to the McAlpine Stadium on Thursday evening for a crucial game for us, but not for them. Hopefully, they will already be..............

......but judging by their performance on Saturday, they ain't even packed a suitcase yet, never mind boarded the plane.

They beat Preston 4-1, with manager Flippin Heckingbottom stating that they want to finish the season off with over 90 points. This ain't gonna be easy.

But under the leadership of Neil Warnock and his trusty assistant rocket Ronnie Jepson, we've become a very hard team to beat. Following an excellent win down in Cardiff, we now only need one point from the final two games to stay up for another crack at the Championship. And with Rotherham beating Boro on Monday, it's down to us and Reading for that final relegation spot.

Let's do it here and now. We DO NOT want a last day shoot out!

Team news? Well hopefully Heckingbottom will select a team of kids, having sent his first teamers off on a nice extended holiday. Can't see that happening somehow. Town will stick with what we had on Sunday, all being well. Danny Ward seemed to damage something whilst over stretching in the first half and could be rated as a probable doubt, but we'll wait and see. I'll post Mr Warnock's words of wisdom whenever I can.

A brief history of Sheffield United: formed in 1889 by members of the Sheffield United Cricket Club, who needed somebody to move into Bramall Lane after The Wednesday had moved out following a row over gate receipts. Bit of an odd argument seeing as the President of the Sheff U Cricket club, Sir Charles Clegg was also President of The Wednesday.

United were originally called the Cutlers and it was Wednesday who were the Blades. But when Wendy moved to Owlerton, they became the Owls and the Cutlers nicked their old nickname to be known ever since as the Blades.

Their first season of action saw them reach the FA Cup 2nd round. Even though they hadn't yet joined a league, they managed to beat First Division Burnley 2-1. Full of confidence, they headed across the Pennines to Bolton and came back with a record 13-0 defeat, a record that still stands today. That setback however, spurred the directors into getting the team regular matches and so they joined the Midland Counties League for the 1890–91 season.

That was for just one season though. They then joined the Northern League. A third placed finish encouraged them to apply to join the Football League. The FL was expanding and United were voted into the newly formed Second Division for the 1892/93 season.

They won promotion straight away. From thirteen nil to the First Division in four years. They got there via the Test Matches, a similar idea to the modern day Play Offs. They finished 2nd in the league behind Small Heath (now Birmingham City) and played Accrington (not Accrington Stanley) in the Test Match, beating them 1-0.

They went from that thirteen nil to League Champions in ten years as they won the League in 1898, having been runners up in the previous season. They then won the Championship of Great Britain by beating the Scottish Champions, Celtic over two legs, but couldn't match their league form, only narrowly avoiding relegation.

Things improved in the next season and they reached the 1899 FA Cup Final and won it for the first time. They played Derby County at Crystal Palace and were a goal down early on. It wasn't until the hour mark that Walter Bennett equalised but then they ran away with it. Billy Beer (great name!) scored five minutes later before John Almond drove the Rams defence nuts (sorry!) making it 3-1. Fred Priest said amen to the proceedings in the last minute by scoring the 4th and the Blades won the Cup 4-1.

Goal, Billy Beer!

They were back at the Palace two years later, playing amateur side Tottenham Hotspur. Spurs were playing in the Southern League then and held the Blunts to a 1-1 draw, beating them 3-1 in the replay, seven days later at Burnden Park, not a happy place for United.

They were back yet again in the next season at the same venue, playing another Southern League team, Southampton and again it was a 1-1 draw. The replay stayed at Crystal Palace this time though and the Blades won their second FA Cup, winning 2-1. Alf Common, who would later become the first £1,000 transfer, scored the goal in the first match and it was George Hedley and Billy Barnes who scored in the replay.

The next time they made it to the Cup Final was in 1915 and it was the last match played before everything stopped for war. The war had been going for ages already but they decided to finish the season off anyway. That's why this Final was called The Khaki Final owing to the large number of uniformed soldiers in attendance. It wasn't at Crystal Palace this time, it was at Old Trafford to stop disruption in and around the capital. Wartime travel restrictions and the large numbers of men taken away to the fighting meant that the crowd was under 50,000.

The Blades won it, beating Chelsea 3-0. Jim Simmons opened the scoring in the first half, then two late goals from Stan Fazackerley and Joseph Kitchen sealed United's 3rd FA Cup.

They won the Cup again in 1925. That was their fourth and final time of winning it. This time, it was at Wembley Stadium and they were playing Cardiff City. The Blades won it 1-0 and it was Fred Tunstall who scored the goal.

All these wins were with John Nicholson in charge. He was not the manager, but club secretary, but that's just a title, in all reality he was manager. Manchester City had tried to take him as manager in 1926, but he turned them down. He had been in the job for 33 years when tragedy struck in 1932. Whilst crossing the road outside Sheffield Midland Station, he was knocked down by a lorry and killed. Over 6,000 people attended his funeral.

John Nicholson

Nicholson's death coincided with the end of Sheffield United's glory years and they were relegated for the first time soon afterwards, ending a period of 35 years in the top flight. Former Wednesday player, Teddy Davison had taken over the manager's role and he did get them to the FA Cup Final again in 1936. This would be their last ever FA Cup Final and they lost it 0-1 against Arsenal.

He did mange to get them back up again in 1939, finishing as runners up to Blackburn, but beating Wednesday to that promotion spot. War intervened again and so they didn't get much top flight action as 1939/40 got abandoned after only three matches.

Bramall Lane suffered damage in the 1940 blitz, but the team were on form when football resumed in 1945-46. It wasn't proper Football League, so this doesn't count, but they won the League North title, a regional competition with the northern teams from Divs 1 and 2. They finished 6th when the proper league came back, but went down again in 1949. They almost went straight back up again, but it was Wendy doing to them what they did to them in 1939 by pipping them for the final promotion place.

Davison retired in 1952, to be replaced by Reg Freeman. He managed them to the Second Division title in 52/53, but then went and died in 1955. His replacement was Joe Mercer. Joe would go on to win a load of titles as a manger, but not with the Blunts. He would manage England in the 70s, but this was his first managerial job and he managed to get Sheffield United relegated.

They came back up again in 1961 and stayed up for a few seasons before going back down again in 1968. Promoted again in 71, they were top of the league for quite some time, going unbeaten in 22 matches, eventually losing top spot to Man Utd following a defeat at Old Trafford, with George Best scoring the late winner, a goal that is always shown in documentaries about him. This one.....

Having been formed all those years ago by the cricket club, there was always a cricket field next to the football pitch. In 1975, football finally took over Brammall Lane when the new South Stand was opened. This is how it used to look......

The new stand must've been cursed by some old cricket loving phantom or summat because from 6th place in the First Division, they sank all the way down to the 4th Division by 1981. The relegation to the 4th being sealed by a dramatic last minute penalty miss against Walsall by Don Givens, which relegated the Blunts and kept the Saddlers up.

They weren't in the basement for long though. Keith Edwards scored 35 goals in the 81/82 campaign, which saw them win the 4th Division championship. It was Edwards' goals again that won them promotion back to the 2nd Div in 84. Ian Porterfield had been manager for those two promotions, but football fans are fickle and following a couple of poor seasons, they had a fans demonstration, demanding that he be sacked.

Obviously, the fans always know best and so a few seasons later, after various managers had come and gone, Dave Bassett came in and took them back down to Division Three. Don't worry, Blunt fans. Bassett led them to two successive promotions and they were back in the top flight in 1990.

They were up there for 4 years and so were original members of the new Premier League in 92, with Brian Deane having the distinction of scoring the first goal of this new competition that ruined football for a lot of people, but made millionaires out of many more.

So they went down in 1994 and Bassett resigned shortly after. Howard Kendall came in and got them to the 1997 Play Off Final. They blew it, losing 0-1 to Crystal Palace. This will become a recurring theme, Sheffield United making the Play Offs and cocking it up.

Neil Warnock took over the manager's job in 1999 and got them to another Play Off Final. Again they lost, 0-3 to Wolves this time. But good old Colin did get them up a few years later when in 2006, they finished as runners up to Reading and after 12 years in the Championship, they were back in the Prima Donna.

They came straight back down though, in slightly controversial circumstances. They were relegated on the last day of the season, with West Ham staying up when they beat Man Utd. However, the Hammers had played two ineligible players and had been fined instead of having points docked. The Blades complained, but their complaint was thrown out and so their relegation stood. Warnock quit!

Bryan Robson had a short spell in charge, before Warnock's assistant, Kevin Blackwell came back to take the hot seat. The ex Town keeper got them to another Play Off Final. This time it was Burnley who beat them, in 2009, at Wembley, 1-0.

He got sacked after a bad start to the next season. Gary Speed got the job, but left when the Wales job came up. So it was Micky Adams who oversaw the relegation to League One in 2011.

He got sacked and the Blunts had more Play Off failures. We beat them in 2012 at Wembley. Yeovil Town beat them in the semis in 2013. Swindon Town beat them in the semis in 2015.

Chris Wilder came in and decided to by pass the Play Offs. In style as well, winning the League One title in 2017, becoming the 4th team to win all 4 divisional titles behind Wolves, Burnley and Preston.

They finished 10th in the Championship in their first season back, but then went and got promoted to the PL by finishing as runners up to Norwich City in 2019.

They surprised everybody by finishing 9th in the Prima Donna League in 2019/20, but came back down at the end 0f 20/21, finishing in last place.

Last season, we almost got to meet up once more at Wembley, but they missed out by getting beat by Nottingham Forest in the semis of the Play Offs. It was a penaly shoot out defeat after both legs finished two-one to the away side. The scenes after the shoot out were an absolute disgrace with thousands of Nottingham twats invading the pitch with one of them decking United's captain Billy Sharp.

Next season though, they will be back in the Premier League (hopefully swapping places with Forest) after confirming their promotion with a 2-0 win at home to West Brom last week. And good luck to them. Now get your flip flops on, lads. Nowt to play for here.

Head to Head



Town lead the head to head with 39 wins to United's 27, with 36 draws.

That's a lot of matches. One hundred and two to be precise. Five of them came in one season, the 1927/28 season. The first of those came on the 12th of November 1927 and is a match that still stands proud in our list of records as the highest league away win.

Played at Bramall Lane, a stadium that was half football field, half cricket field in those days (see photo in history section), with a crowd of 22,163 in to witness this historic occasion. Town had just finished the last season as runners up in Division One, which followed the previous three seasons when we were Champions of England. This was more of a struggle though, starting the season with three defeats, only to then go and beat Cardiff City 8-2 at Leeds Road.


By the time this game came around, we were in 15th. By full time, we'd moved up to 13th, having blunted the Blades by smashing them by a scoreline of 7 (seven) goals to one. Jack Chaplin was the Town manager and the scoring was opened for Town by Tommy Meads. This was one of only two goals he scored for us before transferring to Reading and later on, he played around 200 games for Spurs, before finishing at Notts County. The other scorers were more familiar names with Billy Smith, George Brown and Alex Jackson all getting two each.

The second meeting came later on in the season and was the first of four games in five weeks. It was in the FA Cup semi finals and was played at Old Trafford on March the 24th 1928.  A crowd of 69,260 turned out to see this one, a record attendance at the time for the stadium, with special trains departing Huddersfield railway station from early in the morning. We had both won the Cup in recent memory, with United winning three years previously in 1925 and Town winning it in 1922.

Town had reached the semis by beating Lincoln City (4-2), West Ham United (2-1), Middlesbrough (4-0) and then a thumping 6-1 win over Tottenham Hotspur at Leeds Road in the quarter final. All of the previous rounds had been at home and so this trip to Manchester was the first game outside of Huddersfield in the Cup run.

United had beaten Notts County, Wolverhampton Wanderers, The Wednesday after a replay and then Nottingham Forest in the quarters.

Town lined up with Billy Mercer in goal with a defence in front of him consisting of full backs Roy Goodall and Sam Wadsworth with half backs Levi Redfern, Tommy Wilson and David Steele. The forward line had Alex Jackson on the right wing, Billy Smith on the left, Bob Kelly and Clem Stephenson at inside forward and George Brown at centre forward.

Town were the favourites to win, but it was United who opened the scoring in the 26th minute through Harry Johnson. He would go on to be the Blades' all time leading scorer, but started his career in startling fashion. His first professional match for United came in a reserve game at Beck Lane against Heckmondwike in 1916. He aggravated the locals so much that at one point in the game, he was threatened at gunpoint by a Hecky fan.

Anyway, back to the match in hand and it wasn't a long held lead for them as Town hit back nine minutes later through the Scottish international Jackson. One all at half time.

It was 2-1 to United in the 52nd minute as Johnson scored another one, but as before, they couldn't hold on to the lead as two minutes later Kelly struck a shot against the bar, which was headed home by Brown on the rebound.

The game finished at 2-2 and so a replay had to be played to see who would meet Blackburn Rovers in the Final after they beat Herbert Chapman and his Arsenal team at Filbert Street in the other semi. The FA wanted Town and United to replay on the following Saturday, but that would coincide with the England v Scotland match at Wembley and Town had five players selected for the game. So an emergency meeting of the FA Cup committee was summoned and they came up with the decision that the game should be played in two days time, on Monday the 26th at Goodison Park.

Town made three changes for this match, played at Everton's ground, with Bon Spence replacing Levi Redfern in defence and Johnny Dent taking over the centre forward role instead of George Brown. Tommy Meads replaced David Steele at half back. A crowd of 53,749 went to watch the game, on a working day, in the afternoon. Sadly, our brave boys couldn't finish the job as the game ended goalless after extra time.

So the committee met again and decided that the second replay should be played in a week's time on Monday the 2nd of April. On the Saturday in between these two matches, Town went to Bury and won 3-2, but almost half the team were away playing in that England/Scotland game at Wembley. Roy Gooddall, Tommy Wilson, Billy Smith and Bob Kelly were all in the England line up, with Alex Jackson turning out for the Scots, scoring a hat trick for his country in the most famous match in Scottish footballing history. It was a 5-1 win for Scotland, and it was Town's Kelly who got the English consolation in the last minute.

So two days after that one, the Town and the Blades met up once more in Manchester. At City's Maine Road stadium this time and finally, the Town triumphed. Chaplin made three changes from the first replay. Redfern returned in place of Spence, Ned Barkas came in to replace Wadsworth at left back and Steele was back in in place of Meads. Johnny Dent kept his place ahead of the injured leading scorer George Brown. All five of the players who'd played at Wembley two days earlier, played in this.

There was another massive Monday afternoon crowd, the largest of the three with 69,370 turning out to see that man Jackson score again. Not that he knew much about it. Wilson's free kick was fired in and as the Scottish wizard rose to meet it, he was walloped on the back of his head by both fists of the Sheffield keeper, but the ball still ended in the back of the net, Jackson having just got there first.

He didn't know he'd scored as he laid, dazed on the floor, surrounded by ecstatic team mates. No concussion subs back then, or any kind of subs at all, so he got up, dusted himself down and carried on as the Town held out for a 1-0 win.

He scored another Wembley goal in the Final against Blackburn, but we lost 3-1 and any thoughts of doing the League and Cup double were out of the window. The Final was played on April 21st, not after the league season had finished and so with so many games being postponed, we had a backlog of fixtures.

The league title was still up for grabs, but when Sheffield United came to Leeds Road on Easter Monday, April the 30th, they finally got their revenge for us inflicting so much pain on them during the season. It was Harry Johnson who scored against us again, the only goal of the game. It wasn't the end of our hopes, but a midweek defeat at Villa Park meant that Everton just needed a point to win the title on the final day, which they got with Dixie Dean netting a hat trick against Arsenal, to take his season tally to 60, a record still unbeaten.

And so we were runners up in both competitions. Since then, we have reached the semis on another four occassions. United have made it that far six times, the most recent being last week when they lost at Wembley against Man City.

So what's going on down Bramall Lane? Still managed by Flippin Heckinbottom, the former manager of the BellEnders and the Cabbage. He's also managed Barnsley, his home town club, who were one of the teams he played for and was a season ticket holder as a kid.

In his playing days, as a defender, he took in loads of clubs, starting with Premier League Sunderland and ending in the Conference North with Harrogate Town. In between was mostly lower league stuff with crap like Bradford City, but did play in the Championship with Barnsley and the Wendies.

Saturday's line up at home to Preston:


18 Wes Foderingham - Has won promotion before, with Swindon and Rangers.
6 Chris Basham - Centre back with over 500 career appearances.
15 Anel Ahmedhodžić - Swedish born Bosnian centre back.
19 Jack Robinson - Played for us in 14/15, most of his career in the physio's room.
20 Jayden Bogle - Signed from Derby in 2020.
28 James McAtee - From a great sporting family, which includes World Cup winner Alan Ball.
22 Tommy Doyle - Ditto, with Man City legends Mike Doyle and Glyn Pardoe.
16 Oliver Norwood - Now played over 500 games, 90 of which were for us.
13 Max Lowe - Played at Wembley for Nottingham Florist against us.
10 Billy Sharp - 267 career goals, 7 of which were against us.
29 Iliman Ndiaye - French born, Senegal international, played against England in Qatar.

Subs:
1 Adam Davies - Welsh international keeper, ex Wendy, Barnsley and Stoke.
2 George Baldock - English born Greece international, he's got a Greek granny.
4 John Fleck - Ex Rangers and Coventry, Scottish international midfielder.
8 Sander Berge - Another great sporting family, mum, dad and brother all basketball internationals.
9 Oli McBurnie - Leeds born Scottish international, who knows the inside of many a police station.
12 John Egan - Irish international centre back.
36 Daniel Jebbison - 19 year old striker from Canada.

Recent form - last 6 matches:

Cardiff 1-2 Town
Sunderland 1-1 Town
Swansea 1-0 Town
Town 2-2 Blackburn
Watford 2-3 Town
Town 4-2 Boro

United 4-1 PNE
United 2-0 WBA
Man City 3-0 United (FA Cup)
United 1-0 Bristol City
United 4-1 Cardiff
Burnley 2-0 United

Town are 21st in the Championship table with 47 points. Sheffield United are 2nd with 88.

Leading scorers:

Terriers:
Jordan Rhodes (6)
Matty Pearson (5)
Danny Ward (4)
Own Goals (4)      

Blades:
Iliman Ndiaye (15)
Oliver McBurnie (14)
James McAtee (8)




Manager of the Season: We have a choice of four, Danny Schofield, Narcís Pèlach, Mark Fotheringham and Neil Warnock. Let's compare and contrast.......

After a surprisingly good season in 2021/22, which ended at Wembley with a Play Off defeat, hopes were pretty high for a repeat dose of optimism. Well, as the saying goes; "It's the hope that kills you". Should be our club motto that.

But then, with the players slowly meandering back to the Millers Oils High Performance Complex, a great big spanner was thrown into the works. Out of the blue, the Head Coach and serial quitter, Carlos Corberán, took his bat and ball home on the 7th of July. Director of Football Leigh Bromby announced that Danny Schofield would take over as Head Coach.

So who did we fancy to take over from Carlos then? Well, let's go back and read that statement again. Unbelievably, Town had given Schoey the job full time, not as a cartetaker or interim Head Coach as they say these days. His first HC role at such a critical stage with only a few days to the start of the new season, smells like a big mistake in the making. But he's a club legend, so we'll give him a chance.

It didn't start well. In the searing heat of the Keepmoat Stadium in Doncaster, we watched a severley under prepared squad perform poorly against 4th Division Rovers, eventually losing to a side that had half of their line up listed as "Trialist". It didn't bode well for the up coming game against recently relegated from the Prima Donna League, Burnley and their new Head Coach Vincent Kompany. Young Danny was about to go Head to Head with a man who's got four Premier League champions medals in his pocket.

Although we only lost 1-0, the team stunk. And it didn't get any better with defeats at Birmingham and then an absolute horror show at home to Preston in the EFL Cup. But hope was just around the corner in a much improved performance against Stoke City. Lee Nicholls saved a penalty from Lewis Baker, before home debutant Yuta Nakayama, headed home from a corner. Then super sub Duane Holmes set up a couple of late gaols for Danny Ward and Jordan Rhodes to give us a 3-1 win and we were up and running at last. The Schofield era had it's first of many wins as we set off on another promotion campaign.

It's the hope that kills you!

Danny was dismissed after a depressing defeat at home to Wigan Athletic. In between that Stoke game and the Wigan match there had been a loss at Norwich, a two goal lead thrown away at home to the Baggies, a hopeless loss at Bristol City and a devastating defeat at home to Blackpool in which were were beaten by the goalline technology.

So for one match only, we had joint caretaker/interim whatever you want to label them in the shape of Paul Harsley, who Danny had brought in from Birmingham City as his assistant and Narcis, aka Chico, who had stayed loyal to the club after Carlos had walked out. For the sake of the poll, I'm ignoring Harsley and putting Chico in charge for this one off match. It was as it turns out to be, three of the most important points of the season, coming against a team who would become relegation rivals, Cardiff City.

It was another much improved performance, well it couldn't have got any worse than that Wigan game, in which we took an early lead with little Duane setting up a goal for the prolific Rhodes. But almost as important was another penalty save from last season's Player of the Season, Nicholls, this time from ex Baggieman Callum Robinson.

So Narcis had one his one game in charge, but had made it clear that he was uninterested in taking on the job full time. There was an international break after the Cardiff win and so Dean Hoyle and the increasingly unpopular Bromby had plenty of time to get the next appointment correct. David Wagner had recently returned to the stadium as a guest and was warmly received by fans as he made the half time draw. But his name was rapidly removed from the list as he wanted to bring his own backroom staff and that would've meant the end of a cushy job for Bromby.

And so we got names like Paul Warne of Rotherham and Michael Carrick, who had resigned from his coaching role at Manchester United in the previous season when Ralf Rangnick arrived. Warne went to Derby instead, leaving Carrick as the favourite to take the Town job. But then another name came into the frame. An unfamiliar name, one that only a walking Wikipedia like Jeff Stelling would've heard of, Mark Fotheringham.

That name was dismissed as speculative nonsense, but then as the next game approached, an away game at Reading, somebody posted a video on YouTube of the Town training session, filmed from the McDonald's car park. It appeared to show some tubby bloke taking the lead role in the session. But who on earth was it?

It was Fotheringham! The club, embarrassed by the leak from the car park, had to admit that it was indeed him and tried in vain to big him up as some kind of footballing guru, a coach who had coached with the best in Europe. None of us were buying this drivel, but we were now stuck with him, whether we liked it or not. The club released their own version of the training session to show what a great coach he was, but the only vibe I got was that this bloke had no respect for the lads he was now in charge of. His treatment of young Jon Russell, one of the surprise stars under Carlos, was appalling.

The first match with Mark as boss was a disaster. A 3-1 defeat at the Majestic Ballroom in Reading. A hammering that could still have consequences when the numbers are all added up on Monday. But slowly, things did get better. Performances were no better, but results improved. We won at home to Hull and then Millwall, won at QPR, had back to back wins at Christmas for the first time in the season, against Preston and Rotherham. The win at Deepdale being the first league victory there since 1969. That's probably the highlight of his managerial stint here.

Results and performances were not good in the new year and eventually after throwing away the lead twice in an away game at Blackpool, Deano lost patience and Fothery Flop was chopped. It was Deano now wielding the axe, not Bromby, who it would seem fell under the same chop.

Narcis was back in control for the next two games, with many a Town fan saying that we should give him the job for the rest of the season. Those voices weren't quite as loud as the next two games were lost, a 1-0 defeat at Wigan and then a 3-0 loss at Stoke.

By the time that Stoke game came around though, the new manager had been announced. Live from the Village Vanguard in New York, it's the inspirational former Town manager, 74 year old Neil Warnock. He'd retired from the game last year after his stint at Middlesbrough was ended by Chris Wilder sticking his nose in. Now here he was again after Sharon had got sick of him moping around the house, she told him to get up there and save the Town from the drop to League One.

His first game back was brilliant. Despite going behind to an early Troy Deeney goal for Birmingham, the lads never gave up and seemed inspired from the off. A superb goal of the season contender from Joseph Hungbo brought us level, but then debutant left back Jaheim Headley hit the winner early in the second half. Old Colin had tears in his eyes with the reception he received at the start of the game. He was jubilant at full time, but sadly, the results didn't keep coming.

The next match was an away game at Burnley. Nobody expected us to win, especially Warnock who bigged up the opponents before kick off, saying they were the best team in the Championship for years. That backfired as his own players stood off and let the Claret Jugs walk rings around them in a 4-0 defeat.

That wasn't too bad. The next game was terrible, probably the worst game of the season. Coventry at home. Nothing else to add to that!

A draw at home to Bristol City followed, a defeat at West Brom followed that and then a home draw with Norwich. Town were next to bottom and six points from safety. Has the Warnock gamble failed? Is the silly old fool past it?

Not a chance!

Three games later we were out of the relegation places as wins at Millwall, a remarkable win at home to Midllesbrough and a fantastic victory against Wilder's Watford gave us three wins in a row for the first time since Carlos was King. It was almost four wins in a row, until a late Blackburn equaliser stopped that, but four matches without defeat had given us all hope.

It's the hope that kills you and so when we lost at Swansea and then drew at Sunderland, we were still just above the drop zone. And so with Sheffield United playing in the FA Cup, our game with them was put back, meaning we then had eleven days without a game when everybody else played two or three games. Unbelievably, by the time we did play again, we were still above that drop line, albeit only on goal difference.

Now, following a brilliant Warnock inspired performance down at Cardiff, we are three points above Reading, needing one point for either this game with the Blades or Reading on Monday. From relegation certs, to almost safe with two games to spare. I'd say Warnock is our Manager of the Season.

So who's your manager of the season? Club legend Danny, loyal Narcis, lard arsed Mark or the old codger Neil?

[talkSAFT]

Great read! 

Good luck to Town.

[Lord Snooty]

Here's the gaffer's press conference. Watch out for the stoopidest question ever from Oggy.

[Lord Snooty]

Just seen Haaland get a Guard of Honour from the players and staff at full time at the Man City game tonight.

What a lovely gesture. And what a great idea for something our players and staff could do for Warnock at full time tomorrow after we get the point to stay up.

But of course, it won't happen because there will be thousands of numpties on the pitch if we win.

[jjamez]

Anyone else nervous?

[WakeyTerrier]

No, tonight is definitely a free hit for us.. It would be nice to get the point but if we don't then we know what we have to do on Sunday.

Haaland is some player, just 12 more needed to equal Dixie Deans all time record of 63 in a season with a minimum of 8 games left and a maximum of 9. The other stat that got me last night is that Man City have scored 1000 goals since Pep arrived in August 2016

[SHEP_HTAFC]

I'm nervous for tonight....we lose and it's a massive game on Monday..
And isn't it just Town to go and get relegated on goal difference after Reading win?
And lets not forget....we would be almost down already if Reading hadn't got a 6 point deduction this season....we would have needed to win tonight and on Monday to try save ourselves.
Just play the way we did against Cardiff and we will be ok.

[Lord Snooty]

Thankfully, Reading accepted their points deduction at the time. Can you imagine the pressure on both games now, if there was an appeal pending?

[Lord Snooty]

Anyone else nervous?

I will be if we don't get that point tonight.

[theo_luddite]

Nice one Snoots, must remember to bring my ski's and boots for the weekend.