I felt relegation was my fault.. I want to make up for that
WITH his bionic knee and Buddy Holly glasses, Mick Harford’s second coming as manager has left Luton Town reaching for the scars.
Ten years ago, Harford was in charge when the Hatters, impossibly weighed down by a preposterous 30point penalty, slipped out of the Football League.
On Tuesday, when he turns 60 and qualifies for a free bus pass, he will be on course for redemption after blaming himself, in part, for the club’s five-year exile in non-league wilderness.
And a season which began with Harford undergoing surgery for a replacement right knee joint
– all those years as a rampaging centre-forward on that stupid plastic pitch in the 1980s didn’t help – is heading towards Luton’s third promotion since 2014.
Rolling up his tracksuit trouser leg to show off his scars (right), he cast his mind back to 2009, when the Hatters’ joy at lifting the Johnstone’s Paint Trophy at Wembley was cut short. Eight days later, they were relegated.
“Do I have unfinished business here? Too right. Absolutely, 100 per cent,” said Harford. “That was a bittersweet season, and it shows the strength and courage of this club that, a decade later, we are where we are.
“To win a trophy at Wembley in front of 40,000 of our fans, with our backs against the wall, was a big statement.
“But I still felt responsible when we went out of the league.
“I might have had both hands tied behind my back, but I was at the helm. Relegation hurt me, and it hurt the club for a long time.
“I can still remember exactly where I was when I heard the Football League had deducted us 30 points – I was on an LMA applied management licence course. I was thinking, ‘This licence ain’t going to help me now.’ All the other managers on the course, including Sean Dyche and Malky Mackay, couldn’t believe it.
“They were saying, ‘A 30point handicap? That’s impossible’. But I still believed we could get out of it. Even when we were at our lowest ebb, people still wanted to sign for Luton Town because they knew it was a good club.
“We gave it a right go, but it was too much. And, yes, I did take it personally.”
Fast forward a decade and Harford is back in the hotseat as caretaker manager at time-warp Kenilworth Road after Nathan Jones’ shock defection to Stoke.
In truth, he inherited a winning machine.
Luton are top scorers in League One, 18-goal striker James Collins is the division’s Sky Bet player of the month and they could equal the club’s record 19-match unbeaten league run today. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has made interim managers flavour of the month, and Harford has caught the wave.
“When Nathan left, everyone was surprised and disappointed,” he said. “People thought we might be derailed but we’ve embraced the challenge.
“I wasn’t after this job, but football can be so ironic. My first game back was at Sunderland, against my home-town club and promotion rivals, with nearly 40,000 there, including my family.
“We got a point and probably deserved more. Did it remind me of how good this job can be?
“Yeah, it gets the taste buds going. So here I am, back on the touchline, loving the intensity and fierceness of it all again. I’ve mellowed a bit, but old age creeps up on us all in the end.
“People tell me I don’t look 60... must be all the botox!
“Good luck to Solskjaer – we’re both interim managers, however long it lasts, at different levels, but I regard this as the most important job I have ever had because Luton Town is a big part of me.
“Ole came in and what he did was quite simple, really: He put players in their right positions and it looks like he’s put a smile on their faces again.
“I haven’t changed a thing – style of play, training, the way we go about things on a daily basis.
“It wasn’t broke, so I didn’t fix anything.
“At some point a new manager will come in. But it’s been fun while it lasts.”