Kyle Hudlin Joins Harborough Town for FA Cup Challenge
Harborough Town have pulled off the kind of signing that makes the rest of non-league football sit up and check the team sheet twice.
Kyle Hudlin, one of the tallest professional footballers on the planet at 6ft 9ins (2.06m), has joined the National League North side and will be available for their FA Cup first-round tie away to League One club Leyton Orient on Saturday.
A giant step for the Bees
For a club operating outside the EFL, this is a statement. Not just because of Hudlin’s size, but because of where he has been.
The 26-year-old Birmingham-born striker has worked his way through the pyramid and beyond it. He made his name at Solihull Moors, scoring 17 goals in 69 appearances and grabbing the opener in the 2022 National League play-off final at the London Stadium. That performance helped propel him into the Championship with Huddersfield Town later that summer.
From there, he picked up experience across the EFL on loan at AFC Wimbledon, Burton Albion and Newport County, before a more unconventional move took him to Vietnam’s top flight with Nam Dinh. Now, his next chapter brings him back to English football – and into the heart of an FA Cup story waiting to be written.
Harborough boss Mitch Austin has tracked him for years. He remembers the goal at the London Stadium. He remembers the impact. And he made sure that when Hudlin became a free agent, the conversation happened.
“We met a few months ago through a mutual friend,” Austin told the club’s website. Once he learned Hudlin was available, the interest was immediate. The manager was struck first by the person, then the player – and then by what that combination might do for Harborough’s frontline.
His verdict on the deal was simple: Hudlin’s attributes will give the Bees more firepower going forward, and he is “delighted” to bring him in.
FA Cup stage set
The timing could hardly be sharper. A National League North side heading to a League One ground, a towering centre-forward with Championship and overseas experience leading the line, and the FA Cup floodlights ready to catch every cross aimed at a 6ft 9ins target.
Hudlin is not arriving as a curiosity. He comes as the latest piece in an ambitious rebuild that has seen Harborough consistently tap into EFL experience. Former Wigan Athletic winger Michael Jacobs has already come through the door. So has ex-Middlesbrough and Nottingham Forest striker Britt Assombalonga.
Now they add a striker whose profile is impossible to miss and whose career has already taken in play-off finals, Championship dressing rooms and football on another continent.
For Leyton Orient, he will be a problem to solve on Saturday. For Harborough Town, he might just be the difference between a brave performance and a famous result.
