Speaking for myself, the first time I definitely thought we have could have a season when we would challenge at the top of the table was on 23 August when we went to Luton and won through a combination of Nathan Trott’s brilliance and a fine solo goal from Chris Willock.
The main reason for me feeling like that was that I felt much the same way about Luton as most of the pundits and bookies did. So many of those giving online or other media opinions on the upcoming season in League One before a ball was kicked had Luton marked down as Champions elect and, with them still being in receipt of Premier League parachute payments, I wasn’t going to disagree with them.
Indeed, with City being just one of three sides to have won at Kenilworth Road this season and with Luton having taken sixteen points out of the last eighteen on offer at their “quaint” ground, Luton have displayed promotion contending home form over the course of the past six months.
However, after a decent start on their travels, Luton sit fourteenth in the division’s “away table” with just one point from their last six matches undoing all of their recent good work in front of their own fans. So it is that Luton come here on Saturday stuck in what must be an underwhelming, for them, seventh place, some four points below Huddersfield and Bradford in fifth and sixth place respectively (they have played a game more than the latter, but a game less than the former) with a goal difference which is worse than most of those above them.
With City top of the “home table” in a campaign where they’ve put the awful results at Cardiff City Stadium in recent seasons behind them, Luton are bound to be big underdogs on Saturday, but they will take heart from being one of the clubs that have benefitted from our toils at.home during the final years of our time in the Championship.
City thrashed Luton 4-0 in the game at Cardiff City Stadium in what’s become known as the Covid season (20/21), but the Hatters have won each of the three matches played between the clubs at our ground since then, including last season where, if our game at Luton in late summer 2025 had me thinking we could go up, their victory here in March of that year was the game where I became resigned to our relegation.
On to the quiz, the usual seven questions about our next opponents with the answers to be posted on here on Sunday.
60s. Float along with the club that plays on a ground with a big crane behind one of the goals for Luton stalwart.
70s. Starting off at Highbury as a teenager, this forward played for eight different clubs in four different nations with half of them being in the country he won thirty seven caps for (all five of the sides he has coached or managed at were from that country as well). Luton were his fifth club and he enjoyed a reasonable scoring record during the just over a season he spent with them before moving on to a club a couple of hundred miles away where he scored at a better rate for around a year before his next move saw him travelling thousands, not hundreds, of miles.to his new club. Can you tell me who is being described here?
80s. Kill bloke from Communist Youth League initially! (5,7)
90s. Beatles’ sons appear in Luton Town defence during this decade maybe.
00s. Religious man is tremendous between the sticks!
10s. Which former Luton player from this decade signed for a League One club on loan in January and aimed a bit of a dig at Wrexham manager Phil Parkinson when doing so?
20s Sounds like another Beatles son features in midfield for Luton in combination with a Football League club from 1921 to 1931.
Answers
60s.Bob Morton (Capiellow Park is Morton’s home ground and it has a large crane, built in 1917, behind one of the goals).
Bob Morton was a winger/wing half who made a club record 495 league appearances for Luton between 1946 and 1964.
70s. Adrian Alston played a few non league games for Fleetwood (‘home ground, Highbury) as a youngster before accepting an offer to go and play in Australia. Making a big enough impact to be selected in the Ausralian squad for the 1974 World Cup in Germany, Alson played for Luton in the old Division One in 74/75 before agreeing to join City early in the 75/76 campaign and his goals were instrumental in getting us promoted back to Division Two. Alston struggled to keep his place in the team at the higher level though and moved to America to play for Tampa Bay Rowdies for a while before returning to Australia to end his career. Upon retirement from the game, Alston returned to his native Lancashire, but couldn’t settle and returned to Australia where he had a pretty successful career in coaching and management.
80s. Billy Kellock.
90s. Julian (John Lennon had a son called Julian) James (Paul McCartney has a son called James) played over 300 hundred league games for Luton in the eighties and nineties.
00s. Dean Brill.
10s. Former Luton midfielder Elliot Lee signed for Doncaster on loan from Wrexham last month saying that he was glad to be playing for a manager who made him feel wanted.
20s. Zack (Ringo Starr’s son Zak has played drums for, among others, the Who and the Lightning Seeds) Nelson (Nelson FC played in Division Three North and Division Two of the Football League for a decade between 1921 and 1931) is a midfield player with Luton this season – he’s currently on loan at Wimbledon).
