A new coalition of Huddersfield Town fans has been set up to mark 100 years since the club’s historic hat-trick of First Division championships and to provide a united voice from the terraces.
It’s called The 1908 Group and its members are drawn from the Huddersfield Town Supporters’ Association, Cowshed Loyal, the Huddersfield Town Disabled Supporters’ Club, podcasts And He Takes That Chance and Town Social along with the Smile Awhile fanzine.
The 1908 Group – named after the year the club was founded – has been established to give Huddersfield Town’s supporters a unified voice on issues where they are all in agreement but each will be remaining independent too.
In the short-term they’ve joined forces to honour the players and management who took the club to such glorious heights 100 years ago.
Its first move has been to travel to London to pay respects to Herbert Chapman who managed Huddersfield from 1921 to 1925, winning the FA Cup in 1922 and back-to-back league titles in 1924 and 1925.
This set the foundations for Huddersfield to be crowned champions under manager Cecil Potter for a third consecutive season in 1926 – a first in English football.
On Tuesday (March 3), members of the group laid a blue and white wreath embossed with three gold stars on Herbert’s grave at St Mary’s Church in Hendon, Barnet, and then visited his statue outside Arsenal’s stadium.
Chapman joined Arsenal in June 1925 and led the club to its first ever silverware by winning one FA Cup and two First Division titles before his sudden death in January 1934 from pneumonia aged just 55.
Chapman’s work resulted in Arsenal becoming the dominant team of the 1930s, ultimately winning five League titles and two FA Cups in the decade.
A spokesperson for The 1908 Group said: “The Thrice Champions achievement deserves to be properly celebrated.
“We want to honour the legacy of everyone who etched Huddersfield Town’s name into footballing history and laying a wreath at Herbert Chapman’s grave felt like the right way to begin.”
The wreath-laying is the first of several commemorative initiatives the group has planned for the coming weeks.
The 1908 Group’s five core aims are:
Only five clubs have won the title in three consecutive seasons: Huddersfield Town, Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester United and Manchester City, with the latter being the only club to have won four successive titles.
Huddersfield Town as a club has an event lined up to celebrate the centenary. The Thrice Champions Heritage Evening will be at H Town in the stadium on Thursday, March 19 at 7pm.
This will be a panel session with invited guests talking about the characters and stories from Town’s most successful Thrice Champions period.
It will feature members of some of the families of the players who played for the club as well as a panel of guests who will look back at the achievement and the stories that came from that time.
Memorabilia from the Thrice Champions era will also be on show.
Tickets are £5, including a drink on arrival, and are available by clicking HERE.
The Huddersfield Town v Wycombe Wanderers game on Saturday, April 11 at 3pm will be the official Thrice Celebration game so the match day will have a 1920s twist.
The Town shop has a Thrice Champions retail range including clothes and coins and the range can be seen HERE.
Written by ANDY HIRST who runs his own Yorkshire freelance journalism agency AH! PR (https://ah-pr.com/) specialising in press releases, blogging, website content, copywriting and ghost-writing autobiographies.
