I’ve been following Luton Town FC since the singer Helen Shapiro was ‘walking back to happiness’ in the 1960s. Luton is the bungee club of English football. Since reaching the 1959 FA Cup final, they’ve been boldly bouncing up and down the leagues. It’s only now that Helen’s words are coming true. ‘Say goodbye to loneliness’ – Luton is back in the top flight. The promised land of the Premier League.
Few seats at the ground are without a pillar blocking some part of the pitch
Typically, when they were last in Division One 30 years ago, they voted for the introduction of the EPL – only to be relegated in the season before it all kicked off. Now they’re a team in special measures. Despite playing at Kenilworth Road for more than a century, the EPL has declared that our ground is too narrow for the elite stars of football to play on. But, because Luton has planning permission for a new ground just down the road, they’ve given the Hatters dispensation to use their unique stadium until then.
Mind you, Luton will still have to spend around £10 million to bring the stands at the ‘Kenny’ up to Premier League requirements. The world’s interest in what happens in English football means Luton’s press box, designed for shorthand notebooks, pencils and possibly gentlemen wearing trilbies with ‘Press’ in the hatbands, is just too small to accommodate all those dispatched to cover EPL games.
Finding space for the new media facility, and all the extra television camera positions, means a stand opposite the main enclosure must be rebuilt to accommodate the extra breed of blunts and co. To give you an idea of just how old the ground is, the stand to be replaced is known as The Bobbers. It used to cost a bob, one shilling – OK 5p – to watch from there, and it now houses a series of executive boxes that only adds to Luton’s special charm. Your guess is as good as mine as to whether it can be made ready in ten weeks before the new season starts.
Oh, and they must erect more floodlights too. Even though Luton’s played matches on the telly for years, the current lighting system apparently isn’t bright enough for the Prem’s millionaire players to shine on. Not so super troupers these top-notch footballers. They need more light.
Few seats at the ground are without a pillar blocking some part of the pitch. And the away end… ah the visitor’s end. It’s become a meme on social media. Yes, you enter through the middle of a block of terrace housing in Oak Road but that’s a glorious door to days of yore.
Before motorways, who travelled to away games? Stadiums were built in the heart of a town allowing the menfolk, as it mostly was, to end their Saturday factory shift at noon, walk to the pub, and be in place ready for kick-off at 3 o’clock. Nobody lived too far from their football team.
It means Luton’s ground has character, charm and oozes football from every nook and cranny. Of which there are many. The fans are so close to the pitch that a culture shock awaits a player when they can hear every word the supporters are ‘saying’. There’s no space to protect modern sensitivities.
Luton may not have the amount of cash the big boys have – yet – but they do have a priceless old-school advantage. Away fans will gloat and sing they want to go home, but privately I bet they’ll rue the reality that they no longer have a home ground with the Bovril-and-pie aroma of a proper football arena.
This article first appeared on Toby Young’s substack.
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