HERE’S a pub quiz question for all you football aficionados.
Which two former Littleton players scored in the Championship at the weekend?
To save you scratching your heads, the answer is Matt Smith and Joe Lolley.
Smith salvaged a point for Fulham in a 1-1 draw at Sheffield Wednesday, while Lolley got the equaliser for Huddersfield against Birmingham, a game which also ended 1-1.
Two strikers who are making a name for themselves in the professional game after making the step up from Worcestershire non-league football.
For, not that long ago, the pair were both plying their trade for Midland League Division One side Littleton, albeit not at the same time.
Smith, now 25, played for the village team in 2011 while studying for a degree having been released by Cheltenham Town. Spells with Redditch United, Droylsden and Solihull Moors followed before he was snapped up by Oldham, then Leeds and Fulham, via a loan spell at Bristol City for whom he scored 13 goals.
Lolley’s rise was equally as meteoric. A total of 88 goals in 83 games for Littleton earned him a move to Kidderminster Harriers in the summer of 2013.
A further 11 goals in 25 appearances for the Aggborough outfit saw Huddersfield pay £250,000 to take the 22-year-old to Yorkshire barely six months later.
Now, following his first goal for the Terriers, he too has broken through at Championship level.
It is a remarkable that a club as small as Littleton can lay claim to such success stories.
But it is also proof that there is no barrier to that success if you have the ability.
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