Let me tell you a familiar story.
Sometime in the mid-1880s, a group of industrious workers at the JT Morton’s canning and preserve factory in the East End of London held a meeting in an old tavern called The Islander.
The details are hazy, but out of that meeting a football club was born.
The task of bringing some order to this ragtag bunch of working men, who had taken to calling themselves Millwall Rovers, fell to the landlord’s son, a 17-year-old by the name of Jasper Sexton.
By all accounts he seems to have done a pretty good job, especially for somebody so young.
Thanks to Sexton’s donkeywork, Rovers played their first competitive match on October 3, 1885, on a tract of disused wasteland – they lost 5-0.
I’m not sure whether Sexton blamed the pitch – but you know what they say it’s the same for both teams — but since that defeat the club has dropped the ‘Rovers’ from its name, done its fair share of ground-hopping, won a few trophies and gained a bit of a “reputation”.
And now, in 2017, all that blood and toil and sweat, all that history, hangs in the balance.
Unfortunately, this is a familiar story, too.
Last September, Lewisham Council gave the go-ahead for a controversial plan that will see the New Bermondsey area of the borough undergo extensive redevelopment.
This entails the council issuing a compulsory purchase order on behalf of offshore developer Renewal to seize land currently leased to or belonging to Millwall Football Club.
According to those in the know, such a move would have negative long-term consequences for the club’s youth academy and threaten to undermine the good work done by the Millwall Community Trust.
The upshot of this is that the club may be left with little option but to relocate.
And with land in the capital at a premium, relocation could mean saying goodbye not just to Lewisham, but to London itself.
Indeed, Millwall’s chief executive, Steve Kavanagh, has even mooted the north Kent coast as a potential destination — an exodus that would almost certainly guarantee the death of the club or the emergence of some kind of ‘MK Dons Mark II’.
Now you might be wondering what any of this has to do with Huddersfield Town.
Well, let me tell you, the answer is simple – this is the thin edge of the wedge.
If Lewisham Council succeeds it will send a signal to all those unscrupulous folks out there that working-class institutions, and the complex ecosystems they support, are up for grabs.
With the final decision now postponed until February, there’s still a chance to write a different story.
As such, HTSA will be lending our support to the Back The Den campaign.
If you would like to join us and thousands of others, visit change.org to sign the petition.
Closer to home, HTSA will be running a coach to Sheffield Wednesday on Saturday.
Members can reserve a seat for just £9, while non-members can get one for £11 and we will once again be offering a choice of two pick-up points. The coach will depart from Gooder Street in Brighouse town centre at 11.55am before stopping off at the usual place outside the stadium at 12.15pm.
You can book by ringing our Travel Line on 07905 580784 or emailing Robert Pepper at repepper.rep@gmail.com
Remember, HTSA are the voice of the fans. If you’d like to know more or get involved, feel free to email our Chairman, Trev Whitehead at chair@htsa-online.co.uk.
