Greg Wright: Huddersfield Town's promotion to Premier League could create powerful economic hub

It is hope – that most indestructible of emotions – that really can kill you in the end. But what happens if your dreams are realised? How do you adapt to sudden riches and global opportunities after decades among the also-rans? And how do you use this platform to bring jobs and investment to the world outside the football ground?

This scenario, alive with risks and possibilities, appears in front of Huddersfield Town and its supporters as they prepare for life in the Premier League.

Promotion to the top flight could help to transform the town’s economic prospects forever. To the committed fan, the club’s stunning climb to join the elite shows that it pays to do the right thing, on and off the pitch.

Huddersfield Town have set the template for the way all football clubs should be run. The club has a fill-the-ground ticket pricing policy and it has also established breakfast clubs to ensure local children do not go to school hungry.

It’s owned by Dean Hoyle, the text book example of a local boy made good, who made his fortune from the greetings card business, The Card Factory.

My own journey as a Town fan began at one of the lowest points in the club’s history; September 1977. The first game I witnessed was a dreary 1-1 draw with Torquay.

At the time, the club stood perilously close to the bottom of the old Fourth Division and few fans on the terraces that night could have dreamed that football would ever transform the town’s fortunes.

Today, as a member of the Premier League, Huddersfield will find itself the subject of global scrutiny, at a time when the nation’s economic future hangs in the balance.

Jonathan Oxley, the chairman of the Institute of Directors in Yorkshire and the Humber, believes Town’s promotion will help the region to secure a higher profile as Brexit approaches.

Peter McCormick, the Yorkshire lawyer who has done a stint as acting chairman of the Premier League, predicted that the economic benefits of Premier League status will start with the club, flow out to the town and then out to the wider region.

Huddersfield is a handsome, compact town with a highly regarded university and a dazzling array of businesses.

The problem it has faced, in common with a large number of textile towns, is that many potential investors have only glimpsed it from a train, as they head towards Manchester and Leeds.

If nothing else, Town’s promotion will ensure that more people get off the train and take a look around.

Clair McGowan, the associate director at the CBRE office agency team in Leeds, believes the town’s commercial property market and tourism will benefit from being marketed around the world.

I believe it could lead to a wholesale re-branding of the town, with a focus on sport and culture. Apart from a Premier League club, it already has a thriving media centre and a popular food and drink festival. It might perhaps become a cosmopolitan cultural enclave in the heart of West Yorkshire.

A decade ago, Barnsley captured the imagination when it set itself the goal of becoming Yorkshire’s little slice of Italy.

The idea of rebranding Barnsley as a Tuscan hill village was suggested by the architect Will Alsop, who was hired as a consultant by Barnsley Council. With a dash of enterprise and imagination, Huddersfield could also undergo a radical change of image.

Some might scoff, but Huddersfield does have a once in a generation opportunity to market itself as a regional cultural and sporting destination.

If Huddersfield prospers, then the benefits will flow out to suppliers, hotels and manufacturing firms around Yorkshire’s traditional textile heartlands.

It really could create a legacy with no limits.