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Huddersfield
"For a shilling the Bruddersford United A.F.C. offered you Conflict and Art; it turned you into a critic, happy in your judgement of fine points, ready in a second to estimate the worth of a well-judged pass, a run down the touchline, a lightning shot, a clearance kick by back or goalkeeper; it turned you into a partisan, holding your breath when the ball came sailing into your own goalmouth, ecstatic when your forwards raced away towards the opposite goal, elated, downcast, bitter, triumphant by turns at the fortunes of your side, watching a ball shape Iliads and Odysseys for you; and what is more, it turned you into a member of a new community, all brothers together for an hour and a half, for not only had you escaped from the clanking machinery of this lesser life, from work, wages, rent, doles, sick pay, insurance cards, nagging wives, ailing children, bad bosses, idle workmen, but you had escaped with most of your mates and your neighbours, with half the town, and there you were, cheering together, thumping one another on the shoulders, swapping judgements like lords of the earth, having pushed your way through a turnstile into another and altogether more splendid kind of life, hurtling with Conflict and yet passionate and beautiful in its Art. Moreover, it offered you more than a shilling's worth of material for talk during the rest of the week. A man who had missed the last home match of 't'United' had to enter social life on tiptoe in Bruddersford."
J B Priestley, The Good Companions, 1929
Anyone who travels to Huddersfield by train is
guaranteed to find at least one good pub. That’s because the Head of Steam is
part of the railway station, next to the entrance on St George's Square. It’s on your
right as you leave the station, with another set of doors into the pub straight from the
nearest platform. Handy. It’s one of the mini-chain of
Head of Steam pubs, and
accordingly offers lots of good beers and inescapable railway themeing, along with a
decent food range.
Unfortunately for our purposes, on my last visit (September 2000) it was bloody shut
after the match. This was unexpected. I had visited the new ground before, when in a
moment of weakness I let myself be dragged along to a match as a neutral, and on that occasion, with
Port Vale the visitors, it was very open. Huddersfield sites suggest this as a place to
head to, and I know it was open before our game as a friend was drinking in there,
so it was something of a shame that we
couldn't get in afterwards. Anyway, from my earlier visit I recall a youngish crowd,
particularly in the room with the comfy chairs. The pub is multi-roomed, and I
remember walking through them until I ended up back where I started from. While around
here, be sure to stop and admire the far too large listed Victorian station building, said
to be a classic of its kind. From here the ground is about a fifteen minute walk.
Not only was the Head of Steam shut, but on our September 2000 visit the centre was
excessively policed after the match, which meant that nothing was open around the station.
But we are nothing if not persevering, and have better things to do than hang around on
station platforms. We headed downhill from the station for about ten minutes, where we
found one or two pubs open to those without colours. The Boy and Barrel, where we
ended up, sold only Worthington's, but a decent pint of it.
The Rat and Ratchet on Chapel
Hill is not so close to the station, but it is a splendid beer den with stacks of
different pints to attack, and so should be sought out by any serious drinker. Regular
beers come from the excellent Yorkshire Black Sheep and Timothy Taylor breweries, but they
also brew their own, and reckon to have 14 different ones on at once, which is
bewildering: almost too much choice. Timothy Taylor’s Dark Mild and a Rat and Ratchet
pale ale were both on form on our visit. They also did good food. It is a regular
CAMRA Good Beer Guide entry, much to nobody's surprise. Come out of the station and walk
straight down New Street, through Huddersfield’s compact centre, to where it nestles
by the side of a very busy road. It is, of course, in the opposite direction from the
ground.
If you’ve got time to spare you can get further away than that.
There’s a cab rank outside the station, and we took taxis out to a pub called the
Fieldhead, on Quarmby Road, to the west of the centre. As if
the name doesn’t make it obvious, this is a bit of a middle of nowhere pub, a large
and imposing building with a commanding view down over the Colne Valley. Have a look out
the back if it’s a nice day. The bar staff were welcoming, and the beer was good,
with Stones and guests from small breweries.
From here we hiked about fifteen minutes
along Reinwood Road then right onto New Hey Road in Marsh, and the Marsh Liberal Club.
I know, but don’t be put off by the name. I didn’t see any posters of Charles
Kennedy and no one tried to persuade me of the merits of proportional representation. This
was an excellent Working Men’s club, and very friendly. It had an oldish clientele at
lunchtime, although I imagine it might get busier on a Saturday night, with a good range
of Tim Taylor’s beers and Black Sheep to have a go at. The Golden Best was excellent,
and they also had mild and bitter. As it's a club you'll have to sign in. A CAMRA membership card always
comes in handy. I’m always a bit wary about clubs, as the members
can be sniffy about the public popping in, but they couldn’t have been any nicer
here, even opening up a room for us to watch the morning’s football in. Your only
problem might be finding the gents – it’s best not leaving it until the last
minute to tackle the labyrinthine route – but en route you’ll probably stumble
across the two huge, full sized snooker tables. You could imagine the keenness of the
competitions they have. It’s still miles out from the centre here, so you’ll
want to order cabs back. That said, the taxi service in Huddersfield is excellent.
You might well need them, as you’ll not get much to drink near the
ground. Although I found the pubs welcoming and didn’t encounter any trouble with the
home support, a heavy police presence and the sight of a large amount of Burnley
supporters being marched onto a train after the match indicate that you need your wits
about you. As with many places, there are safer things to be here than an away supporter
in colours swanning around town on a matchday. Although I seem to have used the word
'friendly' more than any other in this guide, Huddersfield do have a small undesirable element in
their support, and caution is advised, particularly on the walk to and from the
ground. I recall having to make something of a quick getaway after a bad tempered match in
the old Leeds Road days. I understand that there are some pubs near the ground, but these
will not admit people in away colours.
The nearest one that I can therefore recommend is the Slubber’s
Arms on Halifax Old Road, approximately north of the station, west of the ground. This
was a good, football-friendly pub, absolutely packed at half past two. Naturally there
were many home fans there, but I did see a good few Clarets tucking into excellent pints
of Timothy Taylor’s Landlord. Yes, it’s a Tim Taylor's pub. Need we say more?
Bar staff and home fans were forthcoming with directions to the ground. It seemed to be one
of those places where everyone has a favourite and superior route. Give yourself
fifteen minutes and follow the crowd. Once you’re under the railway bridge, you
shouldn’t get lost. The pub contains quite a lot of football memorabilia, plus more
than you need to know about the old craft of slubbing, which we understand relates to
the cleaning of cloth.
The ground is, of course, a new development, although it’s not as out
of town as many. In fact, it’s close to the site of the old Leeds Road ground,
presumably now a DIY shed. The old place was an unremarkable ground, but it had one very
interesting feature for Clarets, in that the roof of one of their Popular Side was
identical to that of the Longside. To get to the ground from the centre, take Leeds Road,
down from St George's Square, although you'll need to turn off sooner than in the old
days. When you get to the splendidly named Gasworks Street you can see the ground, so head
down here towards it, although you'll be further away than you think. The new ground has
garnered many accolades and won the 'Building of the Year Award', and tends to be spoken of
as though it belongs in a design museum. Those big blue bendy bits are undoubtedly
striking, particularly as they emerge from traditional streets, but to some extent it looks less
remarkable now that a similar design has been adopted by Bolton and Wigan. I also feel
that the two sets of executive boxes inserted in the stands compromise the overall
aesthetic, their straightness striking a jarring note when all around is curved. Still,
it’s a good view wherever you’re sitting, although fancy new ground or not,
they’d still run out of pies by half time when we were there. There also isn’t a lot of space to
move around the stand, and you don’t get out in a hurry, but at least this must be
the only ground ever where the away end is nearest the town. The away end, like away ends
up and down the land, houses the scoreboard. This, however, isn’t fixed to the roof
as you might expect, but sits on the wall under the curve of the roof. As we were leading
1-0 on our visit, much of the Clarets following spent the last few minutes turning away from the pitch.
As for the town, there was an attempt to launch it as some kind of
northern arts centre a few years back, largely on the strength of one of England’s greatest
living poets: Simon Armitage, who lives in nearby Marsden but has been known to write about
the trials of supporting Huddersfield and the modern art of their ground, but that
doesn’t seem to have come to much. Huddersfield strikes me as a traditional Yorkshire
town, which means there’s some good Yorkshire beer to be had in those pubs.
There’s a Huddersfield pub guide on ‘Down at the Mac’ [http://huddersfieldtown.rivals.net], yet
another ‘Rivals Net' site. You'll not find it, unless you
click here.
It has marks out of
10 (‘The Mac Drinkometer’), and their top pub is the Head of Steam.
Go there for the rest, albeit they’re biased towards chain pubs.
Hanging on the Telephone
[http://www.huddersfieldtown.free-online.co.uk], a rather
jolly site, also has a pub guide, found under ‘fans’ guide’ from the menu. It doesn’t
contain much information, but they have a kind of map and their hearts are clearly in the
right place. Other good websites are the Huddersfield Net [www.thehuddersfield.net], and HTFC World
[www.htfc-world.com], which has visual match reports.
More local pub news is available on the Huddersfield CAMRA website [www.huddscamra.org.uk], one of the best of its kind. It also
has information on local breweries.
Huddersfield is well placed for a long day out, with Manchester and Leeds
being easily reached by rail. Or if
you're feeling suicidal, you could always visit nearby Holmfirth, scene of tv's longest
running and least funny sitcom, 'There's Still a Bit of This Rubbish Summer Wine Left'.
After that, even spending half an hour looking for a pint after the game sounds like fun.
Firmo
Last visit September 2000
Last updated September 2002
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