While it’s certainly managed to position itself as the access language to the rest of the world over the years, with a total of 378 million native speakers and 743 million non-native speakers currently dotted across the globe, there’s no denying it’s a tricky one to pick up.
This 1,400 year old West Germanic language – with close to 50 regional dialect variations in just the UK alone – gives even native speakers many a chance to slip up in their pronunciations from time to time.
Nothing illustrates this more perfectly that the pronunciations of place / location names.
Here in Greater Manchester, our ten boroughs are filled with place names that commonly get mispronounced by anyone other than local residents, so we’ve picked out 10 that are most likely to catch people out.
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Let’s set the record straight.
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1. Daubhill
This area of Bolton is often known to catch even some of the borough’s residents out themselves, so don’t worry if you’re confused by it.
While many would presume it’s ‘dawb-hill / dowb-hill’, it’s actually closer to /dobble/.
2. Blackley
Another one where you’ll need to ignore the way it’s spelled if you want to pronounce it correctly, as it’s not ‘black-ly’ like the colour.
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It’s /blake-ly/ instead.
3. Beswick
This pronunciation may be a little easier to have a crack at first time round if you’re familiar with other similar words and place names across the country.
Think Keswick, Warwick, Alnwick and so on.
Basically, the ‘w’ is silent, just forget it’s there – it’s pronounced /bez-ick/.
4. Greenacres
If we take this Oldham place name, most of us not from the area would likely split the word into two and presume it’s pronounced the same as ‘green’ and ‘acres’ – but we’d be wrong.
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In reality, locals tend to pronounce it as /grin-ickers/.
5. Hulme
This one’s a pretty common word name in the Manchester borough.
Whether it’s used for the area of Hulme itself, or as a suffix to other areas such as Levenshulme, Davyhulme, Cheadle Hulme and so on, people often have trouble pronouncing it.
If you want to get it right, you’ll need to ignore the fact there’s an ‘l’ in there, as it’s silent.
It’s pronounced more like /hewm/.
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6. Altrincham
If we’re talking about pronunciations that don’t make sense, this one’s got to be up there.
The affluent Trafford town attracts crowds from far and wide, and those crowds probably all pronounced the name incorrectly on the first try.
That ‘ch’ sound is actually pronounced as ‘g’.
So rather than it being ‘Altrin-ch-am’ or ‘Altrin-kam’, the pronunciation is actually closer to /oltrin-gum/ instead.
7. Baguley
We’re convinced they stuck the ‘u’ in this place name for fun as a way to trip people up when they try to pronounce it.
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For some reason, it’s actually just pronounced /bag-ly/.
8. Whalley Range
No, we’re not referring to the second word in this particular place name, luckily that’s pronounced exactly as you’d expect.
Whalley, on the other hand, can cause some slip-ups as it’s another case of a silent letter creeping into a spelling and confusing matters, so you’ll want to ignore the fact there’s a ‘h’ in there, and pronounce it closer to /wall-y/.
This isn’t to be confused with the neighbouring Derbyshire town of Whaley Bridge either, as that one’s pronounced /wayl-y/.
Confused yet?
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9. The Haulgh
Yet another Bolton place name that catches even the best of us out.
By looking at the spelling of this one, it’d be easy for most of us Northerners to presume it’s pronounced ‘halsh’ thanks to the popular local bakery chain Greenhalgh’s – which is also a common surname – but again, we’d be wrong.
It’s pronounced the /hoff/.
10. Bury
We had to stick one that’s a bit up for debate on this list, didn’t we?
In the case of this Greater Manchester borough, the pronunciation of the name is very much open for interpretation depending on who you ask, and whoever you ask is likely to be very adamant that their pronunciation is correct too.
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It’s either /burry/ or /berry/ – and if we’re honest, the latter is more commonly used.
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BONUS – Godmanchester
Okay, so this one isn’t in Greater Manchester at all, it’s actually a little town that lies in Huntingdon in Cambridgeshire, but we obviously don’t need to explain why we’ve chosen to stick it on the end of this list.
What we do need to explain is how it’s pronounced, though.
Us Mancunians only need to take one look at this place name to presume it’s pronounced /god-man-chester/, like our wonderful city, just with ‘god’ added in front, but we’d couldn’t be further from correct.
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It’s actually pronounced /gum-ster/.
Why it’s pronounced that way is simply down to regional dialect and nothing else – we can’t really explain it.
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Pep Guardiola hints at when Manchester City fans can expect to see their latest arrival
Danny Jones
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Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has given supporters a rough timeline as to when they can expect to see their new signing, or at least their latest arrival, make his first appearance.
The Blues wrapped up the January transfer window with four major signings: their new attacking number seven, Omar Marmoush (who has already bagged a hattrick on his home debut) promising defensive duo, Abdukodir Khusanov and Brazilian Vitor Reis, as well as their ‘mini-Rodri’, Nico Gonzalez.
However, the club has had another late arrival who was technically signed back at the start of last year but who has spent for the last 12 months or so loaned back to his previous parent club, River Plate in Argentina, waiting to make the move over to the Etihad Stadium – and now he’s here in Manchester.
Speaking on his touchdown in 0161, Pep said Claudio Echeverri won’t be thrown into first-team action straight away but did give a rough estimate as to when City fans could expect him to get involved. You can see him discussing the integration plan in his post-match press conference following the Spurs win.
The mention was only brief but there’s still plenty of reason for Man City fans to be excited by the late January signing.
“Yeah, he [Claudio Echeverri] is going to start to train and mainly will be for the end of the season, maybe the [Club] World Cup and as soon as possible [that] he arrives he can adapt quick for the future.”
As mentioned, the 19-year-old Argentinian attacking midfielder from Resistencia officially put pen to paper with CFG back in January 2024 and was quickly dubbed ‘the next Messi’.
Now, although the football world is often quick to jump the gun with these things and he isn’t the first and certainly won’t be last to be slapped with this premature title, he’s done more to back up these claims since then than he has rubbish them.
Starring at the 2025 Under-20 South American Championships, netting six goals in nine games to finish the tournament as the second highest scorer thanks to notable braces against Brazil and Uruguay as the young Argentine’s finished as runners up.
He also notched 48 senior appearances for River Plate thus far, netting four goals and grabbing eight assists in that time, not to mention having already captained his national team at the 2023 Under 17s World Cup, where he scored another five.
Safe to say there’s plenty of talent to be tapped in this lad.
Once again, Echeverri won’t go straight into the senior set-up for a little while yet, barring a major injury crisis, but he’ll be a more than exciting addition to the City Football Academy and for future first-team lineups for years to come.
Who knows, maybe he’ll be included in an FA Cup matchday squad? Nevertheless, you can expect him to not just come of the bench but hopefully show what he can do at the Club World Cup this summer.
City‘s first fixture as reigning champions of the competition will be against Moroccan side Wydad AC on 18 June 2025.
You can watch Echeverri’s first full interview as a Man City player down below:
The new Man City signing is excited to be finally be part of the club 13 months on from agreeing his contract.
Rochdale has been named Greater Manchester’s ‘Town of Culture’ for 2025
Emily Sergeant
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Rochdale has officially been named Greater Manchester’s Town of Culture for 2025.
Taking over the reins from Bolton – which held the title in 2024 – and following in the footsteps of Stockport before that, which held the title in 2023, and even hosted a massive ‘Town of Culture Weekender’ festival with 50+ free events to celebrate and bring its title year to a close, it’s now the turn of the north-eastern Greater Manchester borough of Rochdale.
Rochdale’s year will build on the town’s already-rich cultural history and international reputation as the home of the co-operative movement.
More than 35 arts organisations will be bringing together an ambitious programme of festivals, exhibitions, events, and performances throughout the year.
Unfamiliar with what the ‘Greater Manchester Town of Culture’ title is all about? It’s an accolade that’s handed out every year to different boroughs across the region.
Bury was the inaugural title-holder 2020 and held onto it in 2021 too due to the COVID pandemic, before being followed by Stalybridge in 2022, Stockport in 2023, and of course, Bolton in the year just gone.
The title celebrates Greater Manchester’s culture and heritage.
As well as getting a new title to shout about, it also sees the towns given a grant from the Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA) culture fund to help develop a programme of cultural events and activities throughout the year.
Rochdale has been named Greater Manchester’s ‘Town of Culture’ for 2025 / Credit: The Manc Group | Rochdale Council
In Rochdale’s case, you can expect the ‘very best local talent’, as this year is promising to put ‘people power’ centre stage, with residents helping to plan, develop, and deliver a lineup of creative activities, alongside a number of major events.
This includes the popular free days out for families, an exciting new urban arts festival, two different food and drink festivals, a lantern parade, the Ignite Fire Festival, a Pride parade, and so much more.
You can also expect live music performances, a new people’s gallery, and even some major international collaborations that are yet to be announced.
Rochdale is taking over the reins from Bolton, which held the title in 2024 / Credit: Rochdale Council
“Rochdale is a place with a rich cultural history, so it is great to name it Greater Manchester’s town of culture as it’s town hall and town centre enter a new era,” commented Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham as the borough was crowned this week.
“Rochdale submitted a fantastic bid for this which, was incredibly exciting and ambitious, while being firmly rooted in its local talent and deep history.
Emily Sergeant -
11th October 2021 
