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With 33 encounters with Huddersfield there are plenty to recall. The one I have selected was in March 2005. It had been an awful season. We had started the season with Sammy McIlroy in charge; then there was Mark Lillis for a caretaker period of a month or so, and then Chris Turner was appointed. He came with a decent record in charge at Hartlepool which had seen him take over at Hillsborough. But it didn’t work out there and he was fired three months before arriving at EP.

He took over at the turn of the year. It had been disaster. Three wins and a paltry 12 points from 15 games meant that we arrived at the McAlpine rock bottom and 14 points from safety. In the early part of the season the goals, (such as they were), had been coming from Luke Beckett and Warren Feeney, (below), with a contribution from Rickie Lambert. Beckett had moved on to Sheffield United, (for £50,000), in November and Lambert went round the M60 to Rochdale In February. Goals were as scarce as the proverbial rocking horse droppings and certainly never enough to challenge the number that were going in at the other end. A young Adam Le Fondre, (so successful at a whole range of clubs in later years), was only on the verge of the team at that point.

After Lambert’s departure Turner signed Chris Armstrong from Queen of the South. He had lasted 6 games up there after spells with both Leeds and Rochdale which didn’t see him make an appearance. It quickly became apparent why. Over the years there’s been some poor players – that’s a natural fact when I’ve seen 737 wear the shirt. But, in my view, Armstrong was up there with them. (But still not anywhere near the league of ‘Marvellous’ Marvin Robinson a few years later!). By the time we got to the McAlpine he had started in 9 games, notched but once, (his single goal in senior football), and had been relegated to the bench the previous week.

He didn’t feature at Huddersfield, but we did see a very first appearance in a County shirt of Ezekiel Tomlinson. Signed by Turner in January after being released by WBA we wondered if he could offer anything. With the best will in the world the answer was ‘no’. A substitute appearance at the McAlpine; starts in the next two games and a substitute cameo in a thumping at Wrexham towards the end of the season were his sum total of contributions. Two players there who came and went without a whimper, like so many before and after them. It’s a tale of my 57 years. The Players Page shows just how many transient players we have had, here today and gone tomorrow. Over the years there have been 265 players who I have seen make 5 or fewer starts!!

Jeff and I settled down in the South Stand, (as chill as ever), that afternoon. Our mantra over the years has been that ‘we travel more in hope than expectation’. Not that day. Hope didn’t even make a fleeting appearance. It was an absolute certainty that another defeat was to be witnessed, to make it 25 in 38 games that season as we were to wend our way on an inexorable path to the bottom Division. And all this a mere 5 years and 3 months since we had stood 6th in the second tier of English football.

By half time a very early goal from Feeney had been equalised and it stood 1-1. The expected happened 56 minutes into the second stanza as Huddersfield took the lead.

We sat back and awaited the deluge. But incredibly within 15 minutes we were 3-2 up. Feeney had helped himself to a hat-trick, the first by a County player since Kevin Francis at Plymouth 12 years earlier. Was the (virtually) impossible about to happen?

Things looked good until 8 minutes from time, when Huddersfield equalised. A minute later the inevitable happened and the tin hat was put on it in injury time as a Joe Dolan own goal saw us end up on the wrong side of a 5-3 scoreline. But there had been a bit of fight. Avoiding relegation was a long shot but maybe we could end the season with a bit of pride. The experience of following County for all these years should have told me what was to come. In the remaining 8 games of the season brought just a single point!! Two weeks later our fate was sealed, and it was to be League 2 football in 2005/06. A time to rebuild possibly. Hardly because 12 months later we were in a fight to the last day to avoid the drop into the Conference.

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Memories of trips to Leeds Road Memories of trips to the McAlpine Stadium

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THE GAMES

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Where the date is in bold click for highlights of the game

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	Date	Venue	Ground	Competition		F	A	Att:
Fri	04/03/77	h	Edgeley Park	Football League Division 4 (Tier 4)	L	2	3	5,449
Mon	27/02/78	h	Edgeley Park	Football League Division 4 (Tier 4)	L	0	1	6,177
Fri	29/09/78	h	Edgeley Park	Football League Division 4 (Tier 4)	W	3	1	5,564
Wed	04/04/79	a	Leeds Road	Football League Division 4 (Tier 4)	D	0	0	2,267
Fri	28/09/79	h	Edgeley Park	Football League Division 4 (Tier 4)	L	1	2	5,369
Sat	16/02/80	a	Leeds Road	Football League Division 4 (Tier 4)	L	0	5	7,561
Fri	25/10/91	a	Leeds Road	Barclays League Division 3 (Tier 3)	W	1	0	9,229
Fri	07/02/92	h	Edgeley Park	Barclays League Division 3 (Tier 3)	D	0	0	7,596
Fri	30/10/92	h	Edgeley Park	Barclays League Division 2 (Tier 3)	W	5	0	5,405
Sat	08/05/93	a	Leeds Road	Barclays League Division 2 (Tier 3)	L	1	2	7,673
Sat	28/08/93	a	Leeds Road	Endsleigh League Division 2 (Tier 3)	D	1	1	7,053
Sat	19/02/94	h	Edgeley Park	Endsleigh League Division 2 (Tier 3)	W	3	0	5,071
Tue	01/03/94	h	Edgeley Park	Autoglass Trophy (Northern Semi-Final)	L	0	1	4,980
Sat	17/09/94	a	McAlpine Stadium	Endsleigh League Division 2 (Tier 3)	L	1	2	9,526
Sat	25/03/95	h	Edgeley Park	Endsleigh League Division 2 (Tier 3)	L	1	2	5,383
Sat	20/09/97	h	Edgeley Park	Nationwide Football League – Division 1 (Tier 2)	W	3	0	6,995
Sat	07/02/98	a	McAlpine Stadium	Nationwide Football League – Division 1 (Tier 2)	L	0	1	11,121
Tue	29/09/98	h	Edgeley Park	Nationwide Football League – Division 1 (Tier 2)	D	1	1	8,023
Sat	06/03/99	a	McAlpine Stadium	Nationwide Football League – Division 1 (Tier 2)	L	0	3	11,914
Tue	19/10/99	h	Edgeley Park	Nationwide Football League – Division 1 (Tier 2)	D	1	1	7,305
Sat	29/04/00	a	McAlpine Stadium	Nationwide Football League – Division 1 (Tier 2)	W	2	0	14,046
Mon	28/08/00	h	Edgeley Park	Nationwide Football League – Division 1 (Tier 2)	D	0	0	6,137
Sat	13/01/01	a	McAlpine Stadium	Nationwide Football League – Division 1 (Tier 2)	D	0	0	10,988
Sat	14/12/02	a	McAlpine Stadium	Nationwide Football League – Division 2 (Tier 3)	L	1	2	7,978
Mon	21/04/03	h	Edgeley Park	Nationwide Football League – Division 2 (Tier 3)	W	2	1	7,159
Sat	07/08/04	h	Edgeley Park	Coca-Cola Football League – League 1 (Tier 3)	L	2	3	7,473
Sat	13/11/04	h	Edgeley Park	FA Cup (Round 1)	W	3	1	3,479
Sat	19/03/05	a	McAlpine Stadium	Coca-Cola Football League – League 1 (Tier 3)	L	3	5	11,180
Sat	09/08/08	a	McAlpine Stadium	Coca-Cola Football League – League 1 (Tier 3)	D	1	1	15,578
Sat	28/02/09	h	Edgeley Park	Coca-Cola Football League – League 1 (Tier 3)	D	1	1	7,739
Tues	11/08/09	a	McAlpine Stadium	Carling Cup (Round 1)	L	1	3	5,120
Sat	26/09/09	a	McAlpine Stadium	Coca-Cola Football League – League 1 (Tier 3)	D	0	0	12,020
Sat	24/04/10	h	Edgeley Park	Coca-Cola Football League – League 1 (Tier 3)	L	0	6	6,887

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