[Lord Snooty]

Huddersfield Town v Morecambe
The EFL Cup 1st round
Tuesday August 13th - 19:45 ko
at the John Smith's Stadium Stadium

HUDDERSFIELD TOWN welcome MORECAMBE to the Town Ground on Tuesday evening for our annual humbling by lower league opposition.

We do come into this match though, riding high on the crest of a wave, top, top, top o' the league after smashing the Posh on Saturday. Will Michael Duff do what every other Town manager has done for the last decade or two, and make a boat load of team changes? Probably. But with players like Herbie Kane, David Kasumu, Danny Ward, Josh Ruffels, Matty Pearson, Chris Maxwell and possibly the new lad from West Ham, Callum Marshall to come in, it won't be like previous seasons when we've had to rely on untried youth to make up the squad. Having said that, I'll be looking forward to seeeing young Tom Iorpenda in action after looking promising in pre season.

As for Morecambe, they got beat 1-0 at Walsall on Saturday and since their transfer embargo was lifted, they have signed 17 new players. So hopefully, they haven't gelled yet.

Personally, I don't recognise any of them, so won't pretend that I know anything.

This match, I think, will be shown on the new Sky Sports+ channel. Let's hope they do a better job than Saturday.

Tickets:

Adults - £10
Under 18s - £5

Home supporters will be seated in the Riverside Stand Upper and Lower Tiers only for this tie. This is an all ticket fixture, therefore there will be no cash turnstiles available on match day.



A brief history of Morecambe FC: formed in 1920, they joined the Lancashire Combination. They won it five times over the next 48 years before joining the newly formed Northern Premier League in 1968. Promotion to the Conference came in 1995 under the management of Jim Harvey.

In 2000, Harvey took on a second job, as assistant to Sammy McIlroy with the Northern Ireland international squad. He suffered a heart attack in 2004 though and his buddy McIlroy, the Man Utd and Macclesfield Town legend, stood in for him. The team reached the Conference Play Offs for the first time in that time, losing 4-3 to Hereford United.

Harvey and McIlroy were long time friends, but that friendship ended when after returning to work, Harvey was sacked and replaced by his old mucker. Such was the fall out that when Harvey took the job at Forest Green, the two of them refused to shake hands with each other when the teams met in November 2006 at Morecambe's Christie Park.

Undaunted by all this unpleasantness, Sammy Mac took them back to the Play Offs in the following season. They beat York City in the semi finals and then played Exeter City at Wembley in the final. After going behind to an early first half goal, the Shrimps were awarded a penalty by 22 year old referee, Michael Oliver. Yes that dickhead! Wayne Curtis had his penalty kick saved though.

Morecambe did equalise just before half time when Gary Thompson scored, taking advantage of a defensive error. Danny Carlton wrote his name in Morecambe FC legend in the 82nd minute, latching on to a long ball from defence and shooting high into the net to win the game 2-1.

After winning promotion, the club announced plans to leave Christie Park which had been their home since 1921. Work didn't start for another couple of years though. They moved in to the Globe Arena in 2010 and the old ground now has a Sainsbury's on it's site.

So the first Football League game in 2007 was played at the old ground, a goal less draw against Barnet. They got off to a great start in the League Cup though, beating two Championship teams, Preston and then Wolves, before losing against Sheffield Utd.

After two mid table finishes, they made the Play Offs in 2010 and as this was the last season before the move to the Globe Arena, the last game at Christie Park was a 2-1 win against Dagenham & Redbridge. Sadly though, this was a second leg game which came after a 6-0 walloping in the first leg. David Artell, the current Grimsby Town boss, scored the final goal there.

The first match at the new place was another League Cup victory against Championship opposition. Coventry City this time, who were beaten 2-0 with both goals being scored by Andy Fleming. The rest of the season was a struggle though and after finishing 20th, McIlroy resigned. He was replaced by Jim Bentley.

After six unremarkable seasons, Bentley left to be replaced by Derek Adams. They were favourites to be relegated, but against all odds, they won promotion to League One at the end of the 2020/21 season. They faced Premier League opposition for the first time, playing against Newcastle in the League Cup and then Chelsea in the FA Cup, but a fourth place finish in the League got them into the Play Offs, where they faced a Tranmere Rovers side that included Town legends, Peter Clarke and James Vaughan. They won 3-2 on aggregate, which meant that they would face Newport County at Wembley.

The Shrimptons came out victorious and won promotion to League One for the first time, but it was Huddersfield referee Bobby Madley, who they have to thank for it. He denied County a stonewall penalty in the first half, but then with extra time being played, he awarded Morecambe a penalty for an offence that took place outside of the area. If only we'd had VAR........

Anyway, it was Carlos Mendes Gomes who tucked it away for the win and that all important place in the third tier of English football.

Three days later, Adams resigned to take over the job at Bradford City. He didn't last long there and so returned to Morecambe just in time to help them avoid relegation.

He quit once more in November 2023 as the club spun into decline, with point deductions for financial irregularities and took up the job at Ross County, a job he'd had twice before. He came back in June for a third spell at Morecambe, but this was after they'd been relegated, thus missing the chance to play the mighty Huddersfield Town in a league match. They will therefore be over the moon at this opportunity to come to the John Smith's after all.

Head to Head



Town lead the head to head with 1 win to Morecambe's 0.

We have a 100% win record against Morecambe. Such has been our dominance in this fixture that we haven't even conceded one goal against this opposition.

We've only ever played them once in competetive competitions though and that was in the 2004/05 EFL Trophy, which was at the time calling itself the LDV Vans Trophy. Morecambe weren't even in the League at that time. They were still in the Conference, not winning promotion until 2007. From 2000 to 2006, the Football League had invited eight teams from the Conference into the competition, which in my opinion is a better idea than inviting Prima Donna League u21 teams in.

Anyway, the game was played at the McAlpine Stadium and Town won 3-0 in front of a crowd of 3,831. And I was one of them.

We were in League One, having won promotion the season before and after a frustrating first half, we took the lead in the 47th minute through David Mirfin. But then four minutes later, club legend and future Head Coach, Danny Schofield went and got himself sent off. Not to worry though, the ten men rallied and scored a couple of late goals to secure the victory.

Junior Mendes scored his first Town goal in the 84th minute from the penalty spot, kick starting his spree of scoring in four matches in a row. Then in the final minute, Lee Fowler, the penalty shoot out winning legend, scored his only proper goal for the club to wrap up at 3-0.






So what's going on down at the Mazuma Mobile Stadium? Managed nowadays by Derek Adams, the ex Bradford City manager. Aged 49 now, he was born in Glasgow in 1975 and started his youth football career with Aberdeen.

He never got a first team game there, so came south to play for Burnley. After just two league appearances for the Claret Jugs, he went back up north and joined Ross County, newly promoted from the Highland League into the Scottish Third Division. A good goalscoring record from midfield earned him a move to the Premiership with Motherwell, where the goals dried up and he was sent out on loan to Ayr United.

Back at the Well though, he did score in a Scottish Cup semi final against Rangers, before transferring back to Aberdeen in 2004. That was just for one season though and he was on the move again, this time to Livingston. That was just another one year stay, which was followed by his first return to Ross County, where he wound up his playing career as player-manager.

He led them to promotion to Division One in 2008 and then in 2010 got them all the way to the Scottish Cup Final, beating Hibs and Celtic along the way. They lost to Dundee United in the Final.

He then left to be assistant manager to Colin Calderwood at Hibs, with his time there being blighted by disciplinary issues, which Wikipedia doesn't say much about. Hopefully Ritchiebaby will fill in some of the deatails on that........

And so in May 2011, he made another return to Ross Co and won the Scottish First Division, meaning they would play in the Scottish Premier League for the first time. Adams was voted Scottish Manager of the Year.

They had two mid table finishes, but then he was poached by massive English club, Plymouth Argyle, who were in League Two. He guided them to the Play Off Final, which they lost to AFC Wimbledon, but got them automatic promotion in the next season. He almost had them in the League One Play Offs, but just missed out in 7th place, before a poor start to the next season saw him booted out.

It was then that he went to Morecambe for the first time, replacing Jim Bentley. And it was promotion through the Play Offs again, beating Newport County at Wembley. That earned him another pop at managing a massive English club, Bradford City, in League Two.

Despite signing a three year contract for the Bantamweights, he didn't see the season out, getting sacked in February 2022 and being replaced by Mark Hughes.

After only a week of unemployment though, he was back at Morecambe, replacing Stephen Robinson who had gone up to Scotland to manage St Mirren. He stuck it out for a year and a half, but then made another return to Dingwall for his third spell as Ross County manager.

He was shocked at the standard of Scottish football since his last spell there, criticising his squad's abilities. They proved his comments correct and so following a 5-0 defeat at Motherwell, he was sacked.

Adams was appointed manager of Morecambe then, for a third time in June this year.

Morecambe in popular culture: Well there's Dame Thora Hird who was born there. And then there's a comedian born as Eric Bartholomew, who formed a partnership with a lad from East Ardsley called Ernie Wiseman. Together they became known as Morecambe and Wise........







Town's League Cup record: is really poor, considering what a big club we are.  

Our best season was back in the 1967/68 season, the season I first started watching. We reached the semi finals then, losing to Arsenal over two legs, but I didn't see any of these games, probably because I was only 7 and my dad obviously thought I was too young for night matches.  

Anyway, to get to that stage we beat Wolves at home 1-0, Norwich away 1-0, West Ham at home 2-0, and Fulham 2-1 at home in a replay after a 1-1 draw down at theirs. In the semi final we went down to Highbury for the first leg and narrowly lost 3-2, with goals from Trevor Cherry and Colin Dobson. Back at Leeds Road for the second leg we drew level on aggregate when Tony Leighton scored early on, but Arsenal scored three times to make it 6-3.

We had a famous win at Bellend Road in 1982/83, which was a 3rd round match. Third division Town had won two legged encounters over Doncaster Rovers and Oxford Utd and then beat the "Champions of Europe", Leeds United 1-0 with a second half goal from David Cowling, which in those days of Town being in their massive shadow, was a thing to celebrate. We lost 1-0 at Arsenal in the next round.

We have only got as far as the 4th round on three occasions. In the 67/68 and 82/83 seasons already mentioned, and in 1999/2000.

That last one was the year we won down at Chelsea in the 3rd round, a famous win and a famous goal coming from Kenny Irons. Earlier we had beaten Scunthorpe Utd and Notts County, both over two legs. And then we went out in the 4th round, beaten at home by Wimbledon, who were in the Premier League back then, 2-1 after extra time.

Since then our record has been appalling. This century we have only reached the 3rd round three times. In 2003/04, our post administration season under the guidance of Peter Jackson, we beat Derby at home and Sunderland away before losing at Reading. In 2013/14, home victories over Bradford City and Charlton Athletic gave us hope of a cup run, only to be dashed by a 1-0 defeat at Hull City. And most recently in 2017/18 when we had a first round bye before beating Rotherham at home and losing at Crystal Palace.

We have been embarrassed by lower league opposition, the likes of Oldham, Rochdale, Mansfield, Notts County, Shrewsbury, Lincoln City, and then Rochdale again in 2020, have all given us a rotten kick up the arse. At least in the last few seasons we've lost to bigger clubs like Everton, Preston and Middlesbrough, but still not got past the 2nd round.

So the only managers to get us to the 4th round of the League Cup are all club legends. Ian Greaves, Mick Buxton and errm *cough cough* Steve Bruce.   Is Michael Duff the man to do it this season?

Apologies if you've read most of this before. It's an update of what I've posted for the last few League Cup threads. We still haven't got anywhere.

[theo_luddite]

Thank you for all that research Mr. Preview.

[theo_luddite]

Just to Iron out any doubt about that goal at Chelsea.



That blob on the sidelines seems familiar
Have to wonder who the pass that landed at Kenny's feet was supposed to go to though.

[theo_luddite]

I was trying to remember who the bloke on The Comedians was that used to take the piss out of Morecambe and their Illuminations. "A new set of traffic lights on the Prom" or words to that effect.

Anyway, I've had a word with the committeh, and tracked him down. He was also resposible for letting everyone know "The pies have come" on The Wheel Tappers and Shunters Social Club.

Step up to the mic, one of Manchester's finest, Mr. Colin Crompton.





Blackpool got it this week, instead of Morecambe.

Ahh, club land as it used to be. Keep deathly quiet during the bingo and don't dare sit at someone else's table, even if it's empty at the time you get there.

[Lord Snooty]

Brilliant. Used to love watching the Wheeltappers.

[Devongone]

These Huddersfield pre-match posts are brilliant.

Just when you think you've finally managed to forget Colin Crompton, some graverobber digs him up. The undead live on.

I was, however, disappointed you didn't find a way to work in the art deco architectural connection of Morecambe ......

[Lord Snooty]

Oh aye. I thought about that but I must've forgot again. I've not been well this week.

[Lord Snooty]

Town’s team vs Morecambe

12. Chris Maxwell
2. Lasse Sorensen
4. Matty Pearson
5. Michał Helik ©
7. Callum Marshall
15. Jaheim Headley
16. Herbie Kane
17. Brodie Spencer
18. David Kasumu
25. Danny Ward
28. Tom Iorpenda

Substitutes

Lee Nicholls; Jonathan Hogg, Ben Wiles, Josh Koroma, Rhys Healey, Mickel Miller, Ollie Turton, Antony Evans, Kian Harratt

[Lord Snooty]

Well that was a decent first half. Three-nil up and barely looked troubled.

First goal was definitely Headley's. Keeper saved the shot and it rebounded in off Jaheim's chest.

Been impressed with young Lasse though. Looked good on Saturday and even better tonight. And also the new lad Marshall. Excellent so far.

[theo_luddite]

I tried Devon. His daughter (apparently) has posted most of his stuff on YouTube.

Here's one that I was probably looking for.



He had more ways of doing a comb-over than Bobby Charlton and Ralph Coates could ever dream of combined.

Apologies, late to the party tonight. Just seen the replays of the first half goals. 5 goals in two games? We struggled to get 5 in 2 months last season.