Huddersfield Town welcome Newcastle Utd to Leeds Road on Sunday afternoon, in front of the Sky Sports cameras again, for the first top flight fixture at the Leeds Road Stadium since a 1-0 defeat by the Wolverhampton Wanderers on the 22nd of April 1972. The crowd that day was a mere 11,677. The crowd on Sunday will be double that.
Town will be looking to continue their good start to the season, when Steve Mounié, a more than adequate replacement for Iwan Roberts, scored twice on his debut. Whereas the Magpies will hope that they can avoid being humiliated live on the telly.
Town have no new injuries reported to add to the long term absentees. Newcastle will be without Jonjo Shelvey, who was sent off on Sunday for stamping on an opponent in the match with Spurs. Also likely to be missing are Florian Lejeune and Paul Dummett who both limped off injured.





A brief history of Newcastle United: formed in the 1890s when Newcastle East End and Newcastle West End merged to become Newcastle United, gained entry to the Football League in 1893. They won promotion to the 1st division in 1898.
In the years before the 1st World war, they won the league title three times (not in a row obviously) and won the FA Cup in 1910, beating Barnsley in the final.
After the war, they won the Cup again, beating Aston Villa in 1924. And in 1927, they were the team who stopped Town winning a 4th consecutive league title, beating us in the table by 5 points. Like us, they have never won it since.
They won the Cup again in 1932, beating Arsenal, but by the end of the decade, as the next war began, they had been relegated and were near the foot of the 2nd division.
After the war, they won the Cup three more times, beating Blackpool in 1951, Arsenal in 1952, and Manchester City in 1955.
The 1960s saw them relegated again, promoted again and by the end of the decade they were playing in Europe, winning the club's last major trophy to date when the won the Inter City Fairs Cup (this was what eventually transformed into the modern day Europa League) in 1969.
Last season they won the Championship.








Head to Head



Newcastle lead in the overall head to head with 26 wins to Town's 21, with 15 draws.

The image of the match programme above, is from the last time we beat Newcastle at home. It was on the 28th of December 1963 and we won 3-0 in a 2nd division match with Derek Stokes, Kevin Lewis and Chris Balderstone scoring.

Both games in our last top flight season in 71/72 ended 0-0. Again, despite what people say about the old days, only 12,829 turned out for the home match.

Last season, we beat them at their place 2-1, surprisingly to a lot of people who had no idea what we were about. They know now! Goals that day were from Nahki Wells and Jack Payne. Dwight Gayle got their spawny goal, a rebound from his penalty which Danny Ward had saved.
In the home match it was the Toon who beat the Town 3-1. Matt Ritchie scored first from the penalty spot, before Daryl Murphy made it 2-0 after kicking the ball out of Ward's hands. The ref deemed it not to be a foul though, even though Ward had to go off injured. His replacement Joel Coleman unfortunately was at fault for their third, tapped home by Gayle. Earlier, Aaron Mooy had pulled one back for Town with a penalty.

There was a classic in the League Cup at Sid James' Park in 2009. Town were 3-1 up early in the second half, with two goals from Theo Robinson and one from Jordan Rhodes. But unfortunately we couldn't hold out and ended up losing 4-3.

Back in 1984, Newcastle came to Leeds Road needing a point to win promotion back to the 1st division. A crowd of 25,101 turned up to see the game, most of them geordies, and Town stormed into an early 2-0 lead with both goals coming from Graham Cooper. However, Newcastle came back to draw the match, giving them the point they needed.





So what's new at Sid James' Park?  Managed nowadays by Kevin Keegan, the former Brut salesman and contestant in the BBC's Superstars programme, known for being a bit of a ranter. He of course, is most famous for his 124 appearances at the Old Showground in the colours of Scunthorpe Utd. Oh and a few years at Liverpool. Oh and ripping his shirt off at Wembley in front of the Queen.
Also, a bit late on in his career he had a bit of time playing in Germany with Hamburg, before moving to Southampton. As one Newcastle fan suggested (Oz in Auf Wiedersehen, Pet); "Hamburg must be a pretty bloody desperate place if he prefers Southampton."








Notable players in their squad:- Malcolm MacDonald, is probably the best known of their squad. Signed from Luton Town, he has already netted 95 times in his Newcastle career. Says he hopes one day to become a successful manager.
Made a name for himself in non league circles with Tonbridge Angels, before Bobby Robson signed him for Fulham for the princely sum of one thousand pounds.






There are others in their squad who are quite well known. Peter Beardsley is one that you may be aware of. He has played a few times for England as well as footballing giants Carlisle Utd, Vancouver Whitecaps and the not so giant Manchester Utd, for whom he never actually played.
Scored 20 goals in Newcastle's promotion season.





In midfield they have a cheeky chappy called Paul "Gazza" Gascoigne. The most naturally gifted English midfielder of his generation, according to some commentators. His hobbies are drinking, eating chicken and fishing.





Also in the squad today, Dwight Gayle who likes a goal or two against us. Scottish international Matt Ritchie can be a bit of a cheat so will have to be watched carefully. Alan Shearer, thinks he's ace. Chris Waddle ex Bradford City. And the awesome centre back duo Ant n Dec.




Pre Season matches:

Accrington Stanley 0–1 Town (Ince)
Bury 1–3 Town (Mounié, Ince, Kachunga, pen)
SV Sandhausen 3–2 Town (Ince, Mounié)
Town 1–0 Girona (Palmer)
Barnsley 0–1 Town (Mounié)
Town 1–2 Udinese (Ince)
Stuttgart 3-3 Town (Van la Parra, Quaner, Scannell)
Torino 2-2 Town (Kachunga, Mounié)

Hearts 1-2 Newcastle (Gayle 2)
Preston 1-1 Newcastle (Mitrovic)
Bradford City 0-4 Newcastle (Murphy 2, Gayle, Mitrovic)
Mainz 2-1 Newcastle (Gamez)
Wolfsburg 1-3 Newcastle (Mitrovic, Ritchie, Astu)
Newcastle 2-0 Hellas Verona (Perez, Atsu)

Premier League:
Crystal Palace 0-3 Town

Newcastle 0-2 Spurs


Newcastle line up v Spurs:

1 Elliot
19 Manquillo
20 Lejeune
2 Clark
3 Dummett
8 Shelvey
14 Hayden
11 Ritchie
17 Pérez
30 Atsu
9 Gayle  

Substitutes
6 Lascelles
7 Ja Murphy
16 Aarons
18 Mbemba
23 Merino
26 Darlow
45 Mitrovic