Match Day Thread Play off Final. Coventry v Luton

Saturday kick off 16:45
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Mark Robins rouses reconstructed Coventry to verge of Premier League
Ben Fisher

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On Coventry City’s last visit to Wembley five years ago, the air conditioning on the team coach conked out en route, hardly ideal preparation for players and staff suited and booted in 33C heat for the biggest game of the season, if not longer. Most removed their ties and opened the collar on their shirts. Mark Robins debated taking his team off the bus but thankfully the iconic arch was on the horizon. For Robins, it represented just another hurdle to overcome, but small fry compared with the events that would follow. Regardless, it is the sort of hiccup Coventry could do without when they take on Luton Town on Saturday for a place in the Premier League.

Robins has grown accustomed to contending with adversity, be it groundshares, pitch problems or protracted takeovers since returning to the club six years ago, though a takeover by Doug King in January finally abated the sense of never-ending uncertainty. Coventry have played home games at Northampton, Birmingham and Burton over the past 10 years, at Burton last August because 65 rugby sevens matches across three days of Commonwealth Games action put paid to their pitch. Coventry were bottom of the Championship in October but ended the regular season fifth, their best finish since dropping out of the Premier League in 2001.


Luton’s Kenilworth Road is crumbling but deserves a Premier League chance

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Robins has proved a master in coping with chaos and a miracle-worker of a manager. When he was reappointed by Coventry in March 2017, they were bottom of League One, 13 points adrift of safety. A month later an EFL Trophy final victory at Wembley, in front of more than 43,000 Coventry supporters, offered a reminder of the club’s appeal, a glimpse into the future. At the start of that summer Coventry were without a chief executive and recruitment department but earned an immediate return to the third tier, defeating Exeter City in the playoff final. Since then, they have finished every season higher than they did the last.

Michael Doyle, whom Robins made his first signing and named captain, recalls a conversation on his first day back at Coventry. “I vividly remember him saying: ‘I’m getting a chief exec in, I’m getting the recruitment sorted,’” says Doyle, who retired last year. Robins also set about improving the gym facilities and making sure there was a dryer in the kit room, in between trying to shield his squad from mounting outside noise. “He was putting things in place on a weekly basis. He has built Coventry from the bottom up. For all he’s done at the club, he’s 90 minutes away from a statue of him going up outside the ground, and there are not many of those. He is just a brilliant manager.”

Robins, who last week signed a new four-year contract, quickly acknowledged Coventry’s need to build bridges with an apathetic fan base. “Mark felt that after relegation and with all the ownership and ground issues that the gap had widened quite a lot,” says the former Coventry defender Jack Grimmer, now of Wycombe. “The fans had become very despondent and attendances were down. He said: ‘Make no mistake, if we have a good season and get things rolling in the right direction, the fans will come back because they are wanting to support the club.’ The fans seemed to just be yearning for that positive vibe.”

Robins introduced rules such as banning mobile phones in the changing room to encourage his players to foster relationships. He also wanted his players to be immersed in the community. Doyle cites building bonds with supporters’ clubs. More than 1,500 fans travelled to Grimsby Town for their first away game in the fourth tier since 1959, a 2-0 win in which Grimmer scored, but it was not all plain sailing. A trip to Yeovil Town’s Huish Park a fortnight later ended in defeat and with disgruntled fans shouting through the windows of the away dressing room.

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Fankaty Dabo lifts Gustavo Hamer on his shoulders after Hamer’s goal put Coventry into the playoff final.Photograph: Greig Cowie/Shutterstock
Six months later almost 8,000 supporters went to MK Dons for an FA Cup fourth-round victory. Four months later Coventry were toasting promotion in Leamington. “Mark said: ‘Listen, we are going to take this club back to the Premier League,’” Doyle says. “I was like: ‘Bloody hell, brilliant.’ It was a big statement. A lot of people would have laughed at him at the time. We had just been promoted into League One and we were a million miles from the Premier League.”

Those who have worked with Robins, the striker who played for Manchester United under Sir Alex Ferguson, speak of a focused character who exudes calm, commands respect and keeps his cards close to his chest. “If you had a good game on a Saturday, you came in on Monday morning and it was almost forgotten about,” Grimmer says. “I remember speaking to him during the season. I had been playing well and about halfway through I just said: ‘How do you think I’m doing, is there anything you think I can work on?’ He said: ‘Well, if you want me to blow smoke up your ass you’ve come to the wrong person – just keep doing what you’re doing.’” Grimmer chuckles.

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Robins walked into relegation battles at his previous clubs – Rotherham United, Barnsley, Huddersfield Town and Scunthorpe United – but his perception as a firefighter does him a disservice. Players improve on his watch and he has turned Gus Hamer and Viktor Gyökeres into two of the most coveted prospects outside of the top flight. Another of their best players, Callum O’Hare, ruptured an anterior cruciate knee ligament in December. The influence of the assistant manager Adi Viveash, who spent nine years coaching in Chelsea’s academy, should also not be overlooked. “Mark didn’t just manage players, he managed the whole club,” Doyle says. “He was on top of everything.”

Robins says that when he returned to Coventry everybody had given up. He has since breathed life and belief into a club unrecognisable to the one he walked into. Robins recalls the former England manager Graham Taylor telling him how stomaching a 17-point deduction at Rotherham in his first managerial job, which left the club fretting about relegation to non-league in 2008-09, would stand him in good stead for the rest of his career – even if it was difficult to compute at the time. “Looking back, he was spot on,” Robins says.

 

Luton’s Kenilworth Road is crumbling but deserves a Premier League chance | Luton Town | The Guardian
Shortly before 8pm last Tuesday, a remarkable act of transfiguration took place at Kenilworth Road. At that precise moment, Luton’s cramped and crumbling old stadium, with a capacity barely above 10,000, became a raging, roaring, hot-headed monster. The noise barely stopped for the next 90 minutes, at which point Luton’s players had seen off Sunderland and were heading to a playoff final at Wembley – and the jokes and sneers about their old ground had resurfaced again on social media.

Does Kenilworth Road deserve to grace the Premier League? If Luton can get past Coventry on Saturday, the only answer is a punchy and unqualified yes. Sure it is no looker. Unlike Craven Cottage, also built in 1905, it will never attract the love of the blue plaque heritage brigade. The wooden main stand is so tight in places that you have to duck your head when you go to the toilet, while the away fans’ entrance in the Oak Road End looks down on residents’ gardens. Yet give me it over any soulless, out-of-town ground any day.


Now Luton face their biggest sliding doors moment since being relegated on the eve of the Premier League in 1992. This, however, isn’t just a story of Luton Townbut of Luton the town, too. For decades it has been a put‑down, a punchbag, a punchline to an easy joke. It is a perennial visitor to books like Crap Towns II and lists of the most awful places in the country. As someone who was born and raised in Luton, I know it has plenty of rough edges. But scratch a little deeper, amid its struggles and chronic lack of investment, and you find hope that Saturday could really transform the town as well as the club.

It boils down to football economics 101. Promotion to the Premier League remains the most valuable prize in the world game, the sporting equivalent of hitting the Euromillions jackpot, with around £170m on offer in broadcast revenue and parachute payments even if Luton go down after one season. Most of it would be spent on a new £100m stadium, slap-bang in the middle of the town centre. There is talk of an economic boost, regeneration, renewed optimism.

There is something else worth stating here. We hear a lot of gushing pronouncements about how much football clubs mean to their communities, especially in times of success or peril. Mostly, though, we are just guessing. But in Luton’s case we actually know. That’s because in 2009, the year the club tumbled out of the Football League, academics found that 47% of Luton residents believed their quality of life would be reduced if professional football in the town ceased.

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The cramped conditions at Kenilworth Road can seat just over 10,000 fans. Photograph: Zac Goodwin/PA
That is a remarkably high figure given many people do not care that much for sport. What’s more, the academics found that 53.5% of respondents to a survey also said they would pay more in council tax to keep the club from going bust. “This tells you the community has a stake in the club too,” one of the report’s authors, David Forrest, told me. “It doesn’t just belong to the owners or the fans. It belongs to the town.”

What makes Luton’s story even more remarkable is that they often had to take the accountancy equivalent of smelling salts as they tumbled down the divisions. During their worst period of financial peril and strife they went into administration three times, had 40 points’ worth of deductions, and endured four relegations. Yet they have endured.

It helps, of course, that they are no longer a vessel for dreamers or mad-eyed schemers. Some fans still shudder at the mention of the former chairman John Gurney, who talked of building a 50,000-seat ground with a “Teflon roof kept up by air pressure” to host Formula One and NFL matches at the same time the club were crashing into administration. He also launched a “manager idol” telephone vote among fans, at 50p a pop, during his disastrous 55-day reign.

Before him there was David Kohler, who dreamed of a 20,000-capacity “Kohlerdome” by the M1 with a pitch placed on a hovercraft that would have been moved in and out of the stadium on match days, while Luton’s chairman in their glory days, David Evans, even called for cat-o’-nine-tails used on hooligans.

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True, every club has its stories of misfortune and woe. But Luton’s have been so ridiculously farcical they could have been penned by Groucho Marx.

It was Evans who banned away supporters in the aftermath of Millwall fans tearing up the stadium in 1985. For decades that was the source of much of the antipathy towards Luton but, in a surprisingly sympathetic Guardian column at the time, David Lacey backed the club. As he pointed out, they were “trying to recreate an age” where it was safe to watch football – and fans could “wear their colours without fear of being abused or attacked, and if they were visiting supporters they were not marched to the ground by the police like prisoners-of-war”.

Times have changed. Attitudes towards Luton, too. But more than 35 years later, one thing has remained resolutely unchanged. As Simon Inglis put it in his 1987 edition of The Football Grounds of Great Britain: “Until you have been to Kenilworth Road you cannot appreciate how cramped is ‘cramped’.” That much is true. As, hopefully, Erling Haaland, Harry Kane and the rest of the Premier League’s biggest stars will soon find out.

 

Parallel lives: Coventry and Luton’s long roads collide in playoff final
Kindred Premier League hopefuls are on the verge of storybook revivals without betting the ranch to get back to the big time
Ben Fisher

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In an era of chronic overspend, transfer embargoes and points deductions for breaking financial rules, how refreshing that two teams who live within their means will contest the Championship playoff final, the English Football League’s showpiece event and a game worth at least £170m to the winner. Not so long ago Luton Town and Coventry City, clubs with a rich tapestry of top-flight moments, were black and blue – it is only five years since they were lining up against each other in League Two – but now they are on the verge of the bells and whistles of the Premier League.

It is the reason the Coventry manager, Mark Robins, described Saturday’s final at Wembley one for the romantics. Coventry spent 34 years in the top tier before being relegated in 2001. Luton were relegated in 1992 after a 10-year stay. Coventry lifted the FA Cup 1987 and Luton the League Cup the following year. Mick Harford was part of that Luton team in 1988. The club’s former manager, assistant manager and now chief recruitment officer says Luton’s story, from stomaching a 30-point deduction that brought relegation to non-league in 2009 to being this close to the big time, is fit for a film. But who would play Harford? “Who’s got a broken nose and dodgy knees?” he says, smiling. “It’s got to be Brad Pitt, hasn’t it?”


Being a Coventry fan used to mean chaos and pain – now it’s time to celebrate

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Too many Championship clubs have bet the ranch and lost, with Derby arguably best qualified to tell the cautionary tale. Others, such as Aston Villa, who won promotion via Wembley four years ago, have got away with it over the years. One chief executive recently declared the division a hellhole, so bleak is its financial picture. Some League One clubs have bigger budgets than Coventry and Luton. Both of their most recent starting lineups were assembled at a cost of little more than £2m, with clever use of the free agent and loan market. Several Championship clubs spent more on agent fees alone from February 2022 to January 2023. “You have to try to remain competitive without killing the club,” Robins says.

Both clubs have been smart in terms of recruitment, with data, due diligence and character references key steps in the scouting process. “They look into you as a person and they really do leave no stone unturned,” says Carlton Morris, who became Luton’s record signing last summer after they paid an initial £1.3m to buy the striker from Barnsley. “I’ve been in situations where there can be bad eggs in dressing rooms and it doesn’t take much for the vibe and the energy to change. It’s like a delicate ecosystem, a changing room. It’s important to keep it healthy.”

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Luton attack Coventry in what turned out to be a warmup for the Championship playoff final at Wembley. Photograph: Mark Thompson/Getty Images
Luton, who reached the playoff semi-finals last season, finished third this campaign despite operating with a bottom-three budget. Coventry have not spent much more. “Us and Coventry are proof that you can succeed in our pyramid even if you don’t risk your club,” says Kevin Harper of the Luton TownSupporters’ Trust. “I think that is a massive message that everyone, particularly in the Championship where people are spending obscene amounts chasing the dream, could learn from. We are a working-class town and we know the value of a pound coin. The club live up to that.”

Both teams have shown they are capable of absorbing disruption. Coventry have been plagued by off-field problems. Luton lost last season’s player of the season, Kal Naismith, to Bristol City last summer and their manager, Nathan Jones, to Southampton in November. Rob Edwards, sacked by their rivals Watford, succeeded Jones and has pushed Luton on again. “Someone said to me: ‘You’ve got the winning formula,’” Edwards says. “I’ll tell you what it is: it’s good people; I’m around good people. You have to have consistency, you’ve got to recruit well, you’ve got to be savvy. Know what you are and try to be good at it and that’s what we have done really well.”

Luton Town (3-5-2)
Ethan Horvath, 27, loan, from Nottingham Forest
Gabriel Osho, 24, free, Reading
Tom Lockyer, 28, free, Charlton
Amari’i Bell, 29, free, Blackburn
Cody Drameh, 21,  loan, Leeds
Marvelous Nakamba, 29, loan, Aston Villa
Pelly Ruddock Mpanzu, 30, free, West Ham
Jordan Clark, 29, free, Accrington
Alfie Doughty, 23, £500,000, Stoke
Carlton Morris, 27, £1.3m, Barnsley
Elijah Adebayo, 25, £250,000, Walsall
Total: £2.05m

Coventry City (3-4-1-1)
Ben Wilson, 30, free, from Bradford
Kyle McFadzean, 36, free, Burton
Callum Doyle, 20, loan, Manchester City
Luke McNally, 23, loan, Burnley
Jake Bidwell, 30, free, Swansea
Brooke Norton-Cuffy, 19, loan, Arsenal
Liam Kelly, 33, free, from Leyton Orient
Gustavo Hamer, 25, £1.3m, PEC Zwolle
Jamie Allen, 28, £150,000, Burton
Viktor Gyökeres, 24, £900,000, Brighton
Ben Sheaf, 25, £300,000, Arsenal
Total: £2.65m

","credit":"","pillar":2}" data-reader-unique-id="69" style="max-width: 100%;">Quick Guide
The £4.7m final: predicted XIs and what they cost
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I hope Luton do it

 

Any particular reason?
Two clubs I’ve not any strong feelings for either way.

 

Means it's not Sunderland or Boro. I'm a bit meh after that.

 

To be honest,no.... Just purely for the fact I want to see their ground host prem football, I've loved every away day I've had there and stadiums like that will almost certainly never be seen at that level again.

 

I also have loved going to Luton,unique ground ,the fans were helpful last time i went,it wasn't a bad night out either....but good luck to em both....Hope its our turn next year!!!!

 

Always found them both quite likeable clubs and fans so good luck to them both

 

I'm just hoping it's a good game for the neutral.

 

Got Cov to win it in extra time @ 11/1

 

I would be happy for either club to win, both have been through tough times, so deserve to get their chance at the top league.

 

Coventry 2-0 after 90 mins. I think coventry will pass around lutons high press and physical style. Wembley has a big pitch

 

Well here we go

My fav match of the year

So much on the line

 

Norton cuffy is a goood player

 

Hope its Luton's day.....because of the conference thing.......I'm sure cov will get up eventually.....not at our exoense of course!!!

 

Who'd have thought, Reese Burke coming
on in play off final, how many castigated him for his lack of ambition when joing Luton ?

 

What happened??

 

He wasnt tackled or anything

Potentially serious

 

Didn't look good, hope he's ok.
Never saw what happened to him.