I assume that if you told City fans around the turn of the year that our last six matches of the Championship season would be a series of dead rubbers, for us at least, with not even a mathematical possibility of relegation involved, then we would have taken it like a shot, but now we’re into them, I find myself looking forward to what the summer rebuilding of our squad will bring more than the prospect of five more performances like the ones we saw against Swansea (although we surely can’t be that feeble again can we?) and at Hull. There is though that totally unexpected win and method of playing at Reading to offer some hope that we can come up with something to make the remaining games more memorable.
Today, we face a Luton side with far more to play for than us – they were the best team in the division in a form table over the last fifteen matches or so I saw over the weekend (we were sixth mind), but we’re unbeaten in our last eight league meetings with them and so we could just dent Luton’s play off hopes this afternoon I suppose.
Here’s seven questions on Luton dating back to the sixties,
60s. Born on the winter solstice, this defender spent the large majority of his time in the game at Luton although he was raised nearly four hundred miles away. He began at a place where they mix iron and coal, but was off over the border to Luton after only playing three times and was a regular in a team that completed the first two steps of an eventual journey from Fourth Division to First in pretty quick time. He migrated south to a club which represents two places and then, having been at a club nicknamed after one item of clothing, he finished his playing time off at one associated with clothing for the other end of the body! Happier with a background role rather than being the man in charge in his career after playing, his one season as a manager saw a club record achieved which stands to this day, but who is he?
70s. Starting off at Borrowash Victoria, this member of a footballing family began his, semi, professional career pretty close to home with a club that were non league back then, but were a team we beat in the Championship as we closed in on promotion in 17/18. Moving from that team to the full time game with Luton, he soon established himself at the higher level and his consistent displays saw him return to his east midlands roots to play in the First Division. Although the side he signed for were in decline,, he twice won Player of the Year awards in his time there before further moves saw him become, first, a rapscallion and then an east coast pioneer – can you name him?
80s. Goalscorer in losing cause against us or in dramatic escape? You decide! (7,5)
90s. Did Luton have to let him go to Chelmsford City because they were in the red?
00s. One way of describing a superb head of faculty I suppose!
10s. He was arrested for being drunk in charge of a car while a City player, scored Hereford’s first ever League Cup hat trick, was sent off while playing for Accrington Stanley, turned down a £200,000 move to Crewe when with a non league team and was compared to Robert Pires by his manager at Luton when they were in the Conference during this decade, who?
20s. Which current Luton player, who City have been linked to in the past, played for his country in a sixteen team tournament in the USA last summer in which they reached the Quarter Finals. Other sides taking part included World Cup hosts Qatar and qualifiers Canada.
Answers
60s. John Moore played for Motherwell in his native Scotland for a short while before moving to Luton for more than a decade. Brief spells at Brighton and Hove Albion and Northampton followed before Moore was recruited to Luton’s backroom staff by David Pleat and he eventually became manager for the 86/87 season which saw Luton finish seventh in the old First Division, their highest ever league finish.
70s. Steve Buckley, brother of former Walsall striker Alan, played left back for Luton in the late seventies after signing for them from Burton Albion. Buckley played most games though for Derby County before being transferred to Lincoln (The Imps) and then Boston United (The Pilgrims).
80s. Radomir Antic scored for Luton in their 3-2 home defeat by us in September 1981 and got the goal which preserved their First Division status to earn a 1-0 win at Maine Road which sent Man City down instead in May 1983.
90s. Andre Scarlett.
00s. Dean Brill.
10s. Stuart Fleetwood.
20s. Amari’i Bell was in the Jamaica squad which competed in the 2021 CONACAF Gold Cup.