Time for Town to create new play-off memories

WHEN Huddersfield Town’s players walk out at Old Trafford this Sunday ahead of their promotion showdown with Peterborough United, almost exactly 16 years will have passed since the club first experienced the joy of winning a play-off final.

May 28, 1995, is a date that is indelibly marked in the minds of all those who were present at Wembley to watch the Terriers beat Bristol Rovers 2-1 in the Second Division final.

Andy Booth and Neil Warnock, respectively Town’s goal-scoring hero and manager that afternoon, are the same – though what they remember the most about that triumph under the Twin Towers is different.

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For Warnock, the abiding memory is of having to make one of the hardest team-talks of his career. For Booth, meanwhile, he may have hit the jackpot on the pitch with a first-half goal but it is more the one that got away afterwards that springs most readily to mind when the talk ever turns to the day Huddersfield clinched promotion to Division One.

“I became a tabloid sensation and even appeared on News at Ten,” explained the 37-year-old when talking to the Yorkshire Post yesterday at the Galpharm Stadium.

“It was all down to my wife telling me before the game that she had won £25,000 on the lottery. I’d been away with the lads for a few days but we’d all met up with our wives and girlfriends on the morning of the match so they could wish us good luck.

“I was really focused on the game so didn’t make too much of a fuss when she told me. But, after we’d won the final and I had scored our first goal, I was interviewed by the press and I mentioned the lottery win.

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“I ended up on every front page the following morning along with most news programmes, including News At Ten. The only problem was it turned out we hadn’t won anything.

“After speaking to the press, I met up with my wife and it was then that she admitted to having made a mistake.

“She had been doing a Sunday Mirror scratchcard and found two ‘£25,000’ logos. It then said ‘turn inside to find out if you have a third’. She did, found another ‘£25,000’ logo and started celebrating. All the other wives checked and agreed she had won.

“The only problem was she was reading another newspaper at the time and we hadn’t won a thing. By then, though, it was too late as I’d told the press.

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“I never did own up, in fact I didn’t tell a soul for another five or six years.”

Booth, now an official ambassador for Town, may not have landed the jackpot but his goal did help land the big prize of promotion.

His strike just before half-time in the 1995 final put the Terriers in front only for Bristol Rovers to equalise just moments later, leaving Warnock with the unenviable task of lifting his troops.

“The equaliser came completely against the run of play,” recalled the Queens Park Rangers manager. “We had been absolutely fantastic in the first half and should really have been two or three in front.

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“When Boothy scored, we at least had some reward but then, while we were still celebrating, Bristol Rovers went up the other end and scored through Marcus Stewart.

“It was a real sickener. It also made that half-time team-talk one of the hardest of my career.

“As the players came back into the dressing room, it was like they had lost rather than still had 45 minutes to play. Everyone was gutted and badly needed a massive psychological boost.

“So, I reminded them of what a good season they’d had and how much better than Bristol Rovers they had been in the first 45 minutes.

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“Initially, it didn’t do the trick and for the first 20 minutes of the second half I thought the players were feeling sorry for themselves.

“But then they snapped out of it and came more into the game. I decided to make a change with 10 minutes to go by bringing Gary Crosby off and Iain Dunn on. I thought at one stage that he (Crosby) was going to throw his shirt at me but then Dunny sent over the cross and we got the winner (through Chris Billy).”

Nine years later, Town were back in a play-off final. Peter Jackson, who had taken over the previous summer for a second time, had led the Terriers to within touching distance of automatic promotion only for a draw at Cheltenham Town on the final day to allow Torquay United to nab third place on goal difference.

That meant a tilt at the play-offs and, after edging out Lincoln City in the semi-finals, Huddersfield met Mansfield Town in the Millennium Stadium with a place in League One at stake.

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Booth, by now back with the Terriers after a stint with Sheffield Wednesday, recalled: “I was more nervous before Cardiff than I had been at Wembley.

“We had thrown automatic promotion away on the last day and could not afford to do the same again. Thankfully, we came through and beat Mansfield on penalties – though only after getting the luck any winning team needs when they got the ball in the net only for it to be ruled out.”

As with last week when Bournemouth were beaten in a dramatic shoot-out, Town held their nerve from the spot to triumph 4-1.

Booth said: “I had only ever taken three penalties before and missed them all, so I didn’t fancy one at all. So, when Mansfield missed their first two, I don’t think there was anyone more relieved than me – apart, perhaps, than Steve Yates, who was down to take our fifth penalty.”

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Huddersfield and their 30,000-plus travelling army of fans will be hoping to enjoy similar celebrations to those that took place in Cardiff when Lee Fowler converted the fourth and decisive penalty.

One man who believes they will be toasting victory is Warnock. The former Town chief, who watched the semi-final triumph over Bournemouth on television, said: “Huddersfield as a club deserve to be at a higher level.

“What I like about the club now is that the chairman (Dean Hoyle) is a supporter who really loves the club.

“Too many people own clubs these days who have no affiliation to them.

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“That bond between the chairman and the club is a big strength for Huddersfield, as seems to be the bond he has with (manager) Lee Clark. That is why Huddersfield have a good chance of going up and I really hope they do it.”