With spoils shared on a breathless afternoon at Kenilworth Road, it’s time to delve beyond the report and discuss the incident and occasion.
I have said plenty on social media about Luton Town this week, and about the ground, but why leave it at 200-odd characters when I can go full tilt on here. Overall, my experience was excellent, and as my first official away media assignment, I can find no fault at all with the Hatters.
Every experience was touched by a genuine warmth. My mate Dayle booked himself a wheelchair ticket by accident, and I know of some places where he’d have been out of luck. At Luton, it was no problem, and he was quickly seated elsewhere. Sure, the away end is accessed through the famous back garden of terraced homes, and it’s certainly not a luxurious part of the world, but is Sincil Bank? No, like our ground, it is a place steeped in the working class traditions that have faded from football in the top flight. No wonder football’s elite turned their noses up at Kenilworth Road, because it must have reminded them of everything that they once were.
The ground feels like it has been built over several years by a child slowly growing up, with stands that don’t match and facilities crammed into a footprint that probably isn’t up to scratch by modern standards. Car parking for media, for instance, was a 20-minute walk away, and we accessed the fanzone through an alleyway that must have been a great place for ambushes back in the 80s. I can’t even imagine what it was like around those tight corners against Millwall in 1985.
I’m not here to wax lyrical about a club that feels so authentic some of the matchday experience takes you back to the dark days of the eighties, but two years ago I got sick of the ground shaming by big accounts on social media, talking about how football’s finest had to slum it at Luton Town. Give me that over the New York Stadium any day of the week.
In my eyes, the game had a traditional feel as well. So much football these days is about marginal gains, tactics, chess-like strategy and overanalysis. In a traditional ground, we got a traditional game, two teams throwing punches, making errors and entertaining fans. We got heroes and villains without the forensic analysis of VAR and in the end, we all went home happy.
Obviously not everyone, a few of ours felt we shouldn’t give away a two-goal lead, and a few of theirs think losing four points to Lincoln City is a massive comedown from when they used to take four points off us, but in the main, a draw was fair enough.
We started well, looking physical and while we weren’t outright long ball, we hit quickly when attacking, and we do like to load the box. Opposition fans and teams that moan about us loading the box and getting the ball in there are mainly jealous that their side don’t do it. That’s fact. I’ve seen enough positive comments about Freddie Draper from Hatters fans to know deep down, away from the football snobbery, a bit of physicality and looking to create mayhem in the boxes goes down well when you’re doing it and not so much when you’re not. Luckily, as a well-known hypocrite, I remember praising Burton Albion for it when Hamer played for them, so I’m consistent
That approach got us a two-goal lead, one from a bit of open play that saw Draper nod in at the back stick, and another ten minutes later from a corner routine that saw Rob Street score with what I think might have been his genitals. What’s crazy is that the xG for that is 0.57, and yet I’m pretty sure that touching Hamer’s knock down with any part of the body causes it to go in. As for Draper’s goal, it was a superb cross by Moylan, and a good header from a player Luton struggled to handle all afternoon.
We won the first 25 minutes, but after that, Luton took the end of the half. Their first is disappointing, we seemed to give up a corner easily as Wickens and Bradley got in a bit of a muddle, and Kodua headed home. Watching back, he is completely unmarked at the back stick, which is hard to take.
Their second is disappointing as well, but Wickens is probably less at fault for that. I know in real time you want your keeper to save from the distance, but the monitors showed some real swerve on the ball taking it away from goal before curling in at the near post. Of course, it’s easy to be critical with a burger in your hand and a belly full of beer when a keeper is beaten from range, and there is a moan about how much time Wells had, but it’s such a good strike. It looks to me like Hamer is committed to his man, and Varfolomeev is unable to get the interception. Bradley thinks the ball is going one way and it doesn’t and that buys Wells the time to score. The xG? 0.04, showing it goes in only four times out of a hundred. Still, it wasn’t undeserved.
