Harrogate Town

Harrogate Town are a professional football club based in Harrogate, North Yorkshire. The club currently compete in EFL League Two, the fourth tier of English football. They are nicknamed the Sulphurites, derived from the famous sulphur springs in the town, which are from natural mineral water.

They were discovered in the 17^th century, and the nickname has followed the team into the current day. The club have been a non-League side for almost all their history until they won promotion to the EFL five years ago.

Harrogate have broken the mould in terms of modern-day management, with Simon Weaver being manager since 2009, almost eleven years longer than his nearest competitor in the EFL. It does help though that his father, Irving Weaver, has been the owner and chairman of the club since 2011!

Harrogate Town Updates

Harrogate last season achieved their highest-ever league positioning in 13^th place, but there was some disappointment in how the campaign ended given they were in playoff contention earlier in the year. In their first three seasons in League Two, they had finished relatively comfortably between the positions of 17^th and 19^th.

This term, Town sit in their lowest position since promotion at current. In 20^th spot in the fourth tier table, they do though have a fairly comfortable seven-point gap above the bottom two, meaning any prospects of relegation back to the National League appear unlikely.

Despite this, the Sulphurites did enjoy a day out at Elland Road for their first-ever competitive meeting with their big Yorkshire neighbours. And they gave an excellent account of themselves against the Championship leaders, losing by only a single goal in the FA Cup 3^rd Round.

To keep up to date with news about Harrogate Town throughout the season check out The Real Efl page.

Harrogate Town Transfer News and Rumours

Harrogate’s business in the summer transfer was fairly minimal in terms of incomings. Ellis Taylor was signed from Championship side Sunderland, with Stephen Duke-McKenna providing competition on the right side of midfield, also from the second tier with QPR. Centre-half Jasper Moon was acquired from Burton, while right-back Zico Asare made the move up a level from Maidenhead.

Some players departed for lower levels, with the quartet of Jonathan Mitchell, Peter Jameson, George Horbury and Josh Mattock all moving to the National League North. Abraham Odoh left for Peterborough United, while Rod McDonald departed for Notts County.

The Sulphurites have further strengthened their backline in January, seeing loan arrivals from Bristol Rovers and Huddersfield in Bryant Bilongo and Eko Solomon, respectively. Oliver Sanderson and Tom Cursons add firepower at the other end of the pitch in attack, while Bryn Morris and Tom Hill will hopefully give some improvements in the engine room.

Harrogate Town Signings

Harrogate have been more active in the winter market than in the summer, thanks to a more disappointing season than their past few. Loan arrivals have made up half of their arrivals, as is typically the case at this time of year.

Two arrivals have come from a division higher, boosting the defensive options for the North Yorkshire side. Tom Cursons will hopefully provide some much-needed strength in the forward area, having scored 25 goals in 30 games in the seventh tier this campaign.

Player	Age	Nationality	Left	Fee	Contract Duration
Ellis Taylor	21	English	Sunderland EFL Championship	Free	2 year
Zico Asare	23	English	Maidenhead United English National League	Undisclosed	Undisclosed
Jasper Moon	23	English	Burton Albion EFL League One	Loan	1 year
Eno Nto	22	English	Derby County U21 (Free Agent) EPL League Two	Free	Month-to-month
Bryn Morris	28	English	Newport County EFL League Two	Undisclosed	Undisclosed
Tom Hill	22	Welsh Ireland	Liverpool English Premier League	Undisclosed	1.5 year
Tom Cursons	23	English	Ilkeston Town English Northern Premier League	Undisclosed	2.5 year
Bryant Bilongo	23	English	Bristol Rovers EFL League One	Loan	6 month
Oliver Sanderson	21	English	Fulham English Premier League	Loan	6 month
Eko Solomon	18	English Dutch	Huddersfield Town EFL League One	Loan	6 month

Harrogate Town Key Matches of the Season

Harrogate have endured a difficult campaign, perhaps their toughest as an EFL outfit. They had a torrid December, and January has been slightly better with two victories, although that optimism around the time of their FA Cup tie has been slightly hit with three winless games since beating Cheltenham.

Meetings with fellow Yorkshire outfits Doncaster and Bradford provided successful home results, as history shows is usually the case when facing the West Yorkshire side. Playing Carlisle in March could be pivotal, given the two clubs' current league positions. The final-day encounter at Morecambe stands out, but hopefully, for Harrogate, any relegation concerns will have been long quashed by the time May comes around.

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Harrogate Town Key Achievements

Their greatest campaign to date has to have been when they won the Play-Offs in 2019/20 to reach the EFL. In the same year, the club completed a double by winning the FA Trophy, although the only disappointment was that this was achieved with the backdrop of lockdown, meaning supporters didn’t see the club's success or their first-ever season in the Football League.

Below we will guide you through Harrogate Town’s major achievements.

• National League Play-Off Winners in 2019/20
• FA Trophy Champions in 2020
• National League North Play-Off Winners in 2017/18
• Northern Premier League Division One Champions in 2001/02
• Yorkshire League Champions x2 – 1926/27 & 1981/82 (Division Two)
• Northern Premier League Division One Cup Winners in 1989/90
• West Riding County Challenge Cup Winners x8 including in 2008

Harrogate Town Current Squad

As previously mentioned, Harrogate have added some depth in the January window, mainly in the form of temporary arrivals for the rest of the campaign. This will hopefully provide them with the quality needed to move further away from the drop zone and towards the top half of League Two, ahead of hopefully a greater campaign next term.

Harrogate Town Attackers

Goals have been a struggle all season long, perhaps best summarised by the fact that top scorer Josh March has only managed four, and that has come in just over 1000 minutes of football. Oliver Sanderson will hopefully add some goals in the second half of the campaign, while James Daly and Jack Muldoon have also contributed with five and four-goal contributions each.  

Harrogate Town Midfielders

Byrn Morris adds some experience needed in the fourth tier for the remainder of the year. Dean Cornelius has been the only relatively consistent performer in terms of minutes in midfield, with the likes of Stephen Dooley, Ellis Taylor and Levi Sutton.

Harrogate Town Defenders

Anthony O’Connor has been a stalwart at centre-half this campaign, alongside summer signing Jasper Moon. Toby Sims has also been a regular at the back, with Eko Solomon arriving as another potential option for Simon Weaver to have at his disposal.

Harrogate Town Goalkeepers

James Belshaw has been a first-choice keeper for Harrogate in three of four competitions this season, keeping eight clean sheets. Mark Oxley played all three EFL Trophy games while playing the final 49 minutes on the opening day of the campaign.

Harrogate Town Managing and Coaching Staff

The current manager of Harrogate Town is Simon Weaver.

After a playing career spent throughout the lower divisions of the Football League and in the Non-League, Weaver moved into management with Harrogate, his only club to date. While having job security with his father the owner, Weaver has certainly earned his title of the longest-serving manager of an EFL club.

Appointed in May 2009, as player-manager, Harrogate were a sixth-tier side until winning the National League North Play-Off Final against Brackley nine years later. That saw them become a National League side for the first time in their history, although they quickly departed with another promotion two years later.

At Wembley, they defeated Nots County 3-1 in lockdown to complete a league and cup double, also lifting the FA Trophy. Unfortunately for Weaver and Harrogate fans, their first season at this level came behind closed doors, but they have since gone from strength to strength in the fourth tier, becoming an established outfit at this level despite their club size.

Harrogate Town Former Managers & Key Coaches

Current manager Simon Weaver will undoubtedly go down as one of the greatest Harrogate managers in their history if he hasn’t made that list already. But there have been plenty of great managers to take the hot seat over the years. While they haven’t managed at the same level as their current man, success isn’t always easy to define, and the club have had plenty in the lower divisions.

Below, we take a look at four of the best managers to ever grace the dugout in North Yorkshire.

Alan Smith 1979 – 1990, 1994 – 1998

• Joined as player-manager in his first spell from 1979, when they were at an all-time low.
• Won multiple promotions, managing 670 games in total, winning 283 of them.
• Held the role of general manager for a year, while also playing 171 games for the club, scoring 41 times across three separate spells.

Gavin Liddle 1998 – 1999

• Spent two years with Harrogate as a player.
• After two years with Birtley Town, he became the top man in North Yorkshire in 1998.
• Resigned in January 1999 having accumulated 26 points from nineteen games in charge.

Neil Aspin 2005 – 2009

• Joined in 2001 as a player-coach, hanging up his boots in 2005.
• Narrowly missed out on the playoffs in three of his four campaigns, finishing fifth in his first full term but lost in the Semi-Finals.
• Believed he had taken the Sulphurites as far as possible before embarking on an extremely successful spell at local rivals Halifax Town.  

Simon Weaver 2009 – Present

• Taken the club to two promotions during his time in charge thus far.
• Managed a staggering 780 games since taking over in 2009, making him the longest-serving manager in the Football League.
• Has the unique privilege of having his father as owner and chairman.

Harrogate Town Legends

The main bulk of the below players have been spread across two time periods. The first of them was in the 20^th century, during their rise through the divisions in the 80s and 90s. The second bulk of players have all played under Simon Weaver, going from the sixth tier to the fourth tier with some exceptional players.

Warren Burrell 2009, 2016 – Present

• Creeping up the all-time appearance list with 390 to date in his tenth campaign at the club.
• Previously had a spell with the club before being jailed for GBH in 2009.
• Two-time promotion winner Harrogate, also tasting success at Wembley in the FA Trophy Final.

Dominic Knowles 2013, 2015 – 2019

• Hit a very impressive ten goals in fourteen games in the Conference North back in 2013 before joining League Two Burton.
• Rejoined the club two years later, hitting another superb tally with seventeen in only 25 games to win promotion from the sixth tier.
• Scored a total of 46 times in almost a century of appearances.

Simon Ainge 2016 – 2018

• Another member of the Conference North winning side, scoring thirteen times as they scored a ton in the league.
• In the previous campaign, he exceeded that tally with 23 goals across all competitions in 42 games.
• Enjoyed by far his most prolific time in front of goal during his career in North Yorkshire.

George Thomson 2017 – Present

• Another current member of the Town ranks, although he has only played once this season, on the opening day.
• Scored 54 times in 301 games for the Sulphurites.
• Hit 24 goal contributions last term in 43 fourth-tier games, finishing as top scorer with sixteen league goals.

Jack Muldoon 2018 – Present

• Scored in each of Harrogate’s five EFL campaigns.
• Played 309 times for the club, scoring 75 times including four consecutive double-figure seasons after joining in 2018.
• Added 30 assists in that time to take his goal contributions to over 100, averaging one every three games.

Harrogate Town Team Metrics and Performance

This is Harrogate Town’s fifth campaign at this level, after winning promotion via the Play-Offs in 2020, after two years in the fifth tier since their first promotion to that level.

Last season, Harrogate flirted with the Play-Offs in the fourth tier for the first time since their promotion, but tailed off towards the end of the year. They recorded their highest points tally (13^th), most wins (17) and fewest defeats (17) in their four years at this level.

In 2022/23, Harrogate dropped a point lower than the previous year but comfortably survived in League Two for the third successive campaign. The year before, in 2021/2022, they scored the most goals at this level (64), but by conceding 75 they finished in 19^th spot.

Survival was achieved even more comfortably in their first season at this level in 2020/21, as Harrogate finished in 17^th place behind closed doors. This was after the Sulphurites had three consecutive finishes inside the playoffs in the years prior, winning promotion twice.

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Harrogate Town Pitch and Amenities

Harrogate Town play their home games at Wetherby Road, currently known as The Exercise Stadium for sponsorship reasons. With an estimated capacity of 5000, the record attendance came in 1950 in the Whitworth Cup Final against Harrogate Railway. In more recent times, an FA Cup 2^nd Round tie against Gainsborough Trinity drew a crowd of 4010, their highest crowd since that cup final.

The ground itself is a fairly unique one with numerous different stands, due to the many improvements it has undertaken and promotions. The biggest changes came in 2014 and 2020, with different regulations between the fourth and fifth tiers meaning that the Sulphurites had to temporarily play their first League Two game at Doncaster’s Keepmoat Stadium.

Wetherby Road has seven stands, named:

• The Duchy Hospital Stand
• The Exercise Stand
• Myrings Home Stand
• Pub Insurance Terrace
• The Kitching Plant Hire Stand
• Barclay LED Stand
• GH Brooks – The Kop Stand

The first two stands are along the sidelines of the pitch, with home supporters housed behind both goals with a mix of terracing and seats. On the other longside, away supporters are split between terracing and seating, with the Barclay LED Stand split between home and away supporters as a standing area.

Harrogate Town Fan Base and Support

Last season was Harrogate’s best in terms of attendance throughout their history, seeing the highest-ever league crowd set with 3905 watching the Yorkshire derby against Bradford City last March. That was one of several times that the league record has been broken since promotion, but last term also saw a mammoth 24% year-on-year growth in their seasonal attendance.

Last term, that stood at 2710, with a very similar figure currently on show despite the threat of relegation. Remarkably, that average is more than the combined total of fans that made their way through the turnstiles during the whole campaign in 2012/13, when the club were in the National League North.

Harrogate averaged three-figure crowds in every season until they won promotion out of the sixth tier, while they have continued to see huge growth despite the relatively small numerical differences. These are unprecedented times for the Sulphurites which show no signs of showing, and they are still fighting to attract the next generation despite being surrounded by much bigger institutions in Yorkshire.

Harrogate Town Rivalries and Notable Matches

Given Harrogate have been a non-League outfit for much of their history, they lack behind many of their more established local sides. Leeds United, for example, have only faced their fellow Yorkshire counterparts competitively once, in an FA Cup tie earlier this year.

In terms of other local outfits, York can be considered nearby, while Halifax can perhaps be considered the strongest of rivals due to their number of meetings. Doncaster and Bradford in particular have become local derbies for Harrogate, but again have a much more successful history. So from this, Halifax can be classed as the Sulphurites' main rival.

Some notable matches between these two teams include:

• March 7^th, 2013 – Conference North: FC Halifax Town 1-2 Harrogate Town
• April 17^th, 2017 – Conference North: Harrogate Town 0-3 FC Halifax Town
• September 24^th, 2019 – National League: FC Halifax Town 0-1 Harrogate Town
• November 26^th, 2019 – National League: Harrogate Town 2-2 FC Halifax Town

Harrogate Town Facts

Harrogate Town History

Harrogate were founded with the name Hotspurs back in 1919, taking their current ‘Town’ aspect after the end of WW1. In the Yorkshire Football League Division Two, they won promotion at the start of the 60s to Division One but finished the decade with two relegations.

In 1981, the club saw consecutive promotions, and they became founding members of the Northern Counties East Division One North. Six years later, they reached the Premier Division and by 1987 they were in the Northern Premier League. They continued their progression up the divisions at the start of the century with two promotions in three years.

By 2004, the Sulphurites were in the sixth tier, and have two failed Play-Off attempts they made it third time lucky after fourteen years at that level. Harrogate quickly progressed into League Two infront of an empty Wembley, also winning the FA Trophy and have since embarked on four successful years in the fourth tier since.

Harrogate Town Social Media Links

To see any regular updates on Harrogate Town, the clubs' social media pages, particularly X, is the best possible way. The club have just over 37k followers on that particular platform, where you can find all the latest news.

https://x.com/HarrogateTown
https://www.harrogatetownafc.com/

Harrogate Town Outlook and Forecast

Harrogate have reverted to their league positions of their first couple of EFL campaigns, sitting in the twentieth spot this term. This perhaps is not a huge surprise given the size of the club, and last season they massively overachieved for most of the season before falling off towards the end.

At current, they look like having their worst campaign since winning promotion to the EFL, but the threat of relegation doesn’t look likely at the moment. Harrogate have a seven-point buffer above the bottom two, and the two sides outside the relegation zone, Tranmere and Newport, have been in dire form at the moment. A slight improvement in recent weeks will have boosted optimism and should stand them in good stead of finishing comfortably in mid-table.

Frequently Asked Questions on Harrogate Town Football Club

How much would it cost to buy Harrogate Town Association Football Club?

I think it is fair to say that Harrogate Town can’t be considered for sale any time soon! Irving Weaver is the owner, and with his son Simon still manager, then it’s safe to say that the club are in safe hands. In their 2023 figures, the club made a £6.8m turnover, while the net assets were £1.6m. Going off these figures, along with their squad value estimated at just under £4m, then it can be gathered that a seven-figure fee would be required to buy the club. As stated above though, it doesn’t appear that the club are going to be up for sale anytime soon.

Who owns Harrogate Town AFC?

Irving Weaver, aged 75, is the current owner and chairman of Harrogate Town. His son, Simon Weaver, is the manager of the club but was already leading the club before his father took over in 2011. He has transformed the club, increasing season ticket sales from seven that year to a 100-fold increase. The ground has undergone huge changes too, and Harrogate are playing league football for the first time. They continue to exceed expectations, with one of the lowest budgets in the EFL, and it's fair to say that a chunk of National League sides will also have more money to spend, making their achievements all the more impressive.

Is Harrogate Town a big club?

No, Harrogate Town are not considered to be a big club. With illustrious nearby neighbours including West Yorkshire sides Bradford City and Leeds United, Harrogate have been a Non-League side for almost all of their existence. That doesn’t mean that they haven’t been successful, and their rise to League Two have been particularly impressive, winning multiple promotions and the FA Trophy along the way. But the Sulphurites are behind most of their League Two counterparts in terms of club size, and in the context of all English clubs they are one of the smallest in ‘the 92’.

Where to watch Harrogate Town AFC?

To watch the club live, you would have to attend a home game at The Exercise Stadium. Alternatively, you could watch one of their 23 league games away from home. As part of the new Sky Sports deal for the EFL, at least 20 Harrogate games will be available to watch on TV too. That includes the Yorkshire derby against Bradford which will be shown on Sky Sports+. While none of their games were picked in the recent TV selections at the start of March, both their fixtures over the Easter Bank Holiday weekend will be available to watch on TV, along with any remaining midweek encounters.