Unofficial Halesowen Town FC Forum

I notice a couple of comments about the referee on the home pre-season match updates. Referee Terry Holbrook has been a regular highlight of pre-season games at the Grove for many years with his usual no-nonsense refereeing style (and his cap if it’s sunny). Terry will be a remarkable 72 years old later this year and became a Football League linesman in 1980 before becoming a Football League referee two seasons later. Amongst his most notable games were:

1985: FA Cup Final between Manchester United and Everton (Senior Linesman)
1989: League Cup semi-final (1st leg) between Nottingham Forest and Bristol City.
1990: League Cup semi-final (2nd leg) - West Ham 3 Oldham 0 at Upton Park.
1991: Charity Shield at Wembley – Arsenal 0 Spurs 0.
1992: FA Cup Quarter Final Replay where old Second Division Sunderland beat Chelsea 2-1 (Terry’s most senior FA Cup tie as referee)
1993: League Cup Quarter Final between Ipswich and Sheffield Wednesday.

Terry continued to referee frequently in the old Division One and missed out on the Premier League’s first season (1992-93) by remaining in the Football League. However, he finally made his Premiership debut in October 1993 at the Blackburn Rovers v. Sheffield United game and became a regular at that level. He finally retired in May 1995 after being granted an extension to the normal retirement age of 48 and all his League games for his final 1994-95 season were in the Premiership. He continued to officiate at a lower level after retirement and was amazingly still refereeing in the Staffordshire County Senior League last season (2016-17).

Well done Terry and long may we enjoy watching you down the Grove!

Terry can be seen in action in this dramatic second half coverage of the Sunderland 2 Chelsea 1 FA Cup game from 18th March 1992: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUFnOByQqoE

This is amazing, thank you DJ. I had no idea our Terry had such an incredible officiating CV.

It's not often that a ref gets such a fond reception at games but he's a great character and has certainly brightened up many friendly matches over the last few seasons. It was particularly nice to see him give Mark Danks an earful back To be out there at 72 is quite remarkable, well done to him.

Brilliant read, thanks for posting DJ.

Fantastic achievements from this ref - and he's still going, incredible.