‘The Kenny’ roars Luton on to date with destiny
Luton win 3-2 on aggregate
They neither forgive, nor do they forget in Luton. Most present to witness this Championship play-off semi-final turnaround remember. The scars of 2009, where a cruel 30-point deduction that essentially ended the club’s Football League stay, remain vivid. A club on their knees were pushed face first into the mud.
Those too young, or not born, have been told. The banner in the corner of Kenilworth Road reinforces the message: “Luton Town. Est. 1885. Betrayed by the FA in 2008.” So this victory, already a moment of life-affirming joy, tasted all the sweeter. “The fans deserve this,” said manager Rob Edwards. “They’ve been through some really dark times. It feels incredible.”
Despite the strictest of instructions not to leave their seats, swathes of spectators swarmed the pitch at the final whistle. One more performance, and the Premier
League will come to Kenilworth Road. There it could meet a side put together on a playing budget that would barely cover Erling Haaland’s left radius.
Edwards deserves great credit. Most thought Nathan Jones’s midseason departure would halt Luton’s ability to fight above their weight class. But he has both continued, and improved on, his predecessor’s work. Watford manager when the season began; toast of Luton by the end of it. “It happened so quickly,” Edwards said of his spell at Vicarage Road. “But that’s in the past. It’s like it didn’t happen.”
Luton are masters of squeezing every last drop out of every last player, and out of every possible advantage. They knew this tie was not over despite Sunderland leading 2-1. For on these evenings, their old fortress sparkles with neglect and dereliction.
The Kenny, as the locals know it, has more internet memes mocking its “between-terraced-houses” turnstiles than the number of fans those same turnstiles allow fans through. But my word, it shook. It shook for every tackle, every pass, every throw-in won. And it shook when Gabe Osho and Tom Lockyer grabbed the goals that first levelled the overall score and then poked Luton in front.
The salt in Sunderland’s wounds? Luton’s scorers were centre-backs, a position they have had no one to fill for weeks. It was one step too many for Tony Mowbray’s young upstarts. They will come again. Luton will go again. It could be magical.
Luton Town (3-5-2) Horvarth; Osho, Lockyer, Bell; Drameh, Mpanzu, Nakamba, Clark (Campbell 83), Doughty; Morris, Adebayo. Subs Shea (g), Potts, Berry, Burke, Onyedinma, Taylor. Booked Clark, Mpanzu. Sunderland (3-4-2-1) Patterson; Roberts, Hume, O’nien; Gooch (Huggins 77), Neil (Ba 77), Ekwah, Diallo; Pritchard (Alese 57), Clarke; Gelhardt (Michut 64). Subs Bass (g), Lihadji, Anderson. Booked O’nien, Alese.
Referee Simon Hooper (Wiltshire). Att 10,013.