Today I'm going back four years to 2018 and Tottenham's visit to the John Smith's Stadium to play Huddersfield Town in a Premier League fixture. This was only my second ever visit to this location and it had previously been known as the McAlpine Stadium on my only previous visit in 1995, the first season in which the Stadium had been open.
In my head the Stadium is still "new" because Town had moved there from their old home on the Leeds Road and which I had managed to visit three times in the late 1970's and early 1980's. It's not new at all however and has been in use now for over 27 years. The stadium is shared with the Rugby League side Huddersfield Giants and, in addition to being known as the McAlpine and John Smith's Stadium over the years, was also known as the Galpharm Stadium between 2004-2012. I understand that the shared tenancy of the Stadium does cause some problems for the football club who are unable to explore all the sources of revenue that might be open to them if they owned the stadium outright. The design of the stadium, even after 27 years is refreshingly modern and different from other new grounds in this country. All four stands have sweeping curved rooves and open corners and the stadium has won more than one design award since it opened.
Today's featured programme cover star is the rather sweaty-looking Terence Kongolo. Despite being born in Switzerland to Congolese parents, Kongolo has earned four caps for Holland ("Dutch caps" tee hee) between 2014-2018. Kongolo moved to the Netherlands when he was four and was raised there but continues to hold Swiss citizenship for reasons unknown. Kongolo's career has been patchy to say the least. After starting out at Feyenoord in Rotterdam (138 appearances scoring 3 goals), he was transferred to French Ligue 1 side AS Monaco for a large fee but went on to make only 6 appearances there before moving on to Huddersfield Town in 2018. After a total of 60 appearances for the Terriers, scoring just one goal in a spell which included a disappointing relegation from the Premier League, Kongolo eventually moved to Fulham where he has since spent much of his time injured.
At the time of the featured match, Huddersfield were six games into the new Premier League season and found themselves rock bottom of the table without a win and with just two points to show for their efforts. Head coach David Wagner had worked miracles two seasons earlier in getting The Terriers promoted into the Premier League via the Play-Offs and, even more astonishingly, had kept them up in 2017/18 finishing in 16th place. This time around however it looked as if things were going to be even more tricky and the visit of Spurs was to prove to be another unhappy day for Town. In front of a near capacity attendance of 23,855 Tottenham's Harry Kane, wearing a fetching green kit that would dazzle us all in Amsterdam the following year, scored twice in the first half. His first, a far post header, made him Tottenham's fifth highest scorer ever (he is now second behind only Jimmy Greaves) and his second came from a rather dubious penalty awarded after Danny Rose went down all-too-easily in the box. Spurs never looked like relinquishing a two goal lead and left Huddersfield with three more points in the bag.
Sadly for Huddersfield, they were destined to finish at the foot of the table, gathering only 16 points all season. Their two seasons in the sun had brought to an end a run of 45 years outside the top flight and here's hoping that it's not as long before they're back in the top Division again. Mauricio Pochettino's Spurs had a very good season which culminated in a fourth place finish and Champions League qualification ahead of Arsenal in fifth. The season almost ended in the ultimate glory for Tottenham as, against all odds, they made it all the way to the Champions League Final in Madrid where they would eventually lose to Liverpool. So near and yet so far!
CRB Match No. 2255
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