In less than a decade ago

[Lags]

Luton were non league.

 

Now they are one game away at Wembley from the Premier League.

 

Why can't we...can we hope that's us?

[oafc1955]

Absolutely…we’ve don’t it once and there’s no reason why we couldn’t do it again! I think the Championship is definitely a realistic target!

 

Coventry have had no end of problems sharing grounds and fighting possible liquidation over the last decade or so and were down in league two at the start of the 18/19 season but are now within touching distance of the Premiership.

 

Brentford, Brighton & Bournemouth are three more clubs who have managed to get amongst the big guns against all odds!

 

As a football club we are in the best state we’ve been in for at least 30 years and who knows where we’ll be and what we could achieve in the next decade or so!!

Edited May 16, 2023 by oafc1955

[rudemedic]

31 years and 14 days ago they were 1 game from the Premier League too. Whereas we were 1 game away from being in the top half of the top flight.

 

Football is a fickle mistress.

 

 

[Ritchierich]

Luton are lighting the path for us, feckin brilliant and I hope they finish the job next week

 

Eric Morcombe would be proud

[Monty Burns]

7 hours ago, oafc1955 said:

Absolutely…we’ve don’t it once and there’s no reason why we couldn’t do it again! I think the Championship is definitely a realistic target!

 

Coventry have had no end of problems sharing grounds and fighting possible liquidation over the last decade or so and were down in league two at the start of the 18/19 season but are now within touching distance of the Premiership.

 

Brentford, Brighton & Bournemouth are three more clubs who have managed to get amongst the big guns against all odds!

 

As a football club we are in the best state we’ve been in for at least 30 years and who knows where we’ll be and what we could achieve in the next decade or so!!

l wouldnt say bournemouth was against the odds given the massive amount of russian petrochemical money that illegally washed them ashore in the prem. but l fully endorse your sentiment and hope we have a similar destination on our radar. l was going to say 'but in a far more ethical way' but then l remembered our new kits are made by blowing up inncocent babies

ffs lm supposed to be pretending that isnt true.

[yarddog73]

11 hours ago, Lags said:

Luton were non league.

 

Now they are one game away at Wembley from the Premier League.

 

Why can't we...can we hope that's us?

26th April 2014 had a drink with plenty of Luton fans in the Spoons in Manchester who were in party mode going up as Champions from the National League, I was on route to watch us win 1-0 in our last game of the season at league 1 Carlise who had none other than Jordan Pickford in goal, Luton were playing Hyde United away who they would also beat 1-0 to break through the 100 point barrier, it's a funny old game.

[ShireBlue]

9 minutes ago, yarddog73 said:

26th April 2014 had a drink with plenty of Luton fans in the Spoons in Manchester who were in party mode going up as Champions from the National League, I was on route to watch us win 1-0 in our last game of the season at league 1 Carlise who had none other than Jordan Pickford in goal, Luton were playing Hyde United away who they would also beat 1-0 to break through the 100 point barrier, it's a funny old game.

I live across the street from a Luton fan who was at that Hyde game. He’s given me many a pep-talk recently about the fortunes of football.

[nzlatic]

Luton are showing what can be achieved by running a club well and sensibly. And that its possible to have that level of success without the need to find a billionaire with loose pockets.  Are they a one-off? It's hard to know without knowing what other clubs are being run in a similar manner. Hopefully this is a solid blueprint for us to follow.

 

Might have to give the @BPAS episode with the suppoerts trust another listen.

[Frankly Mr Shankly]

Think it's getting easier for a prudent, well-run and stable club to smash through the leagues. Easier than moneybags teams who often squander their investment and traditional 'big clubs' who have been run shambolically, anyway.

 

I think the step up from Championship to Premiership becomes the bigger barrier now, especially given the parachute payments reducing it to the same 3-4 clubs yo-yoing about.

 

Having said that. Personally I'd not enjoy a Premiership return. Or at least, my enjoyment would be tempered massively. I'd barely afford* an awayday in the Championship, let along the Prem so I'd be reduced to watching most matches on the telly. Id much rather be able to afford to watch in person regularly and the ceiling for me would probably be the upper reaches of L1.

 

* When I say afford, it'd mean sacrificing holidays and nice things to watch us get absolutely twatted by Brentford.

[Worcester Owl]

Fantastic and commendable optimism in posts above, and yes Luton's resurrection is a tremendous achievement.

 

Let's get out of the NL first though.

[Monty Burns]

13 minutes ago, Worcester Owl said:

Fantastic and commendable optimism in posts above, and yes Luton's resurrection is a tremendous achievement.

 

Let's get out of the NL first though.

yes l did mean to say distant distant distant longer than long term aim. 

but still there tho.

[GlossopLatic]

Facing Coventry in the final fair to say both sets of fans have been through it down the years I'm glad one of them is going to be a premier league club next season.

 

Have to say Mark Robbins has done a remarkable job there, he could never have been our Manager but when you think about the amount of times he was linked a little bit of you wonder's what might have been..

[daniel]

15 minutes ago, GlossopLatic said:

Facing Coventry in the final fair to say both sets of fans have been through it down the years I'm glad one of them is going to be a premier league club next season.

 

Have to say Mark Robbins has done a remarkable job there, he could never have been our Manager but when you think about the amount of times he was linked a little bit of you wonder's what might have been..

Sure Robins is from Oldham aswell isn’t he? Done a remarkable job there. 

[GlossopLatic]

4 minutes ago, daniel said:

Sure Robins is from Oldham aswell isn’t he? Done a remarkable job there. 

 

Yes he is from.Chadderton I believe, he went through Boundary Park boys he's one that got away both as player and a manager. In a parallel universe where he doesn't score that goal and ends up playing and possibly managing us for us he's an Oldham Legend.

[oafc1955]

Luton have done it with crowds averaging only 10k in the Championship so fair play to them but  I’d like to think that with a promotion push we wouldn’t be too far away from that figure in the National League!

[Littlemoor Lad]

On 5/17/2023 at 12:51 AM, Ritchierich said:

Luton are lighting the path for us, feckin brilliant and I hope they finish the job next week

 

Eric Morcombe would be proud

He wouldn't about your spelling Ern 

Morecambe

[O.A.F.C.]

10 hours ago, oafc1955 said:

Luton have done it with crowds averaging only 10k in the Championship so fair play to them but  I’d like to think that with a promotion push we wouldn’t be too far away from that figure in the National League!

I'd be amazed.  We haven't had that since being relegated from the prem!!  

[oafc1955]

Why would you be amazed?

 

We just averaged over 6600 in a season where we spent most of our time in the bottom eight of the National League and where the vast majority of our opponents were from Southern England.

 

If we can get some much overdue success I think it’s definitely achievable!

[daniel]

19 minutes ago, oafc1955 said:

Why would you be amazed?

 

We just averaged over 6600 in a season where we spent most of our time in the bottom eight of the National League and where the vast majority of our opponents were from Southern England.

 

If we can get some much overdue success I think it’s definitely achievable!

I agree. We had 8000+ home fans in for Dorking, so the fan base is there, it’s just difficult to get that 8000 in every week, but winning football matches helps massively with that. Their 10k attendances also include away fans, which I presume is around 1200 at their small ground. We’d get a hell of a lot more away fans in the higher leagues. It’s a pipe dream at the moment, but I take heart from the likes of Luton and Coventry having success. There are far better squads in the Championship than them, so it goes to show that good recruitment and having a strong management team in place can work wonders. 

[League one forever]

19 hours ago, Frankly Mr Shankly said:

Think it's getting easier for a prudent, well-run and stable club to smash through the leagues. Easier than moneybags teams who often squander their investment and traditional 'big clubs' who have been run shambolically, anyway.

 

I think the step up from Championship to Premiership becomes the bigger barrier now, especially given the parachute payments reducing it to the same 3-4 clubs yo-yoing about.

 

Having said that. Personally I'd not enjoy a Premiership return. Or at least, my enjoyment would be tempered massively. I'd barely afford* an awayday in the Championship, let along the Prem so I'd be reduced to watching most matches on the telly. Id much rather be able to afford to watch in person regularly and the ceiling for me would probably be the upper reaches of L1.

 

* When I say afford, it'd mean sacrificing holidays and nice things to watch us get absolutely twatted by Brentford.

Easy to say when we’re 3/4 divisions below that level. If we went through the divisions you’d be there with the rest of us.

[Monty Burns]

1 hour ago, O.A.F.C. said:

I'd be amazed.  We haven't had that since being relegated from the prem!!  

lm amazed at this comment

[O.A.F.C.]

2 hours ago, oafc1955 said:

Why would you be amazed?

 

We just averaged over 6600 in a season where we spent most of our time in the bottom eight of the National League and where the vast majority of our opponents were from Southern England.

 

If we can get some much overdue success I think it’s definitely achievable!

I don't think we can increase our average attendance by another third before winning a promotion (or two) first.  

 

I think last season was such a brilliant effort that we'll struggle to improve in this division even if we were doing well.

[Ritchierich]

5 hours ago, Littlemoor Lad said:

He wouldn't about your spelling Ern 

Morecambe

Thank you, noted and will try to do better next season

[BPAS]

On 5/17/2023 at 11:28 AM, nzlatic said:

Luton are showing what can be achieved by running a club well and sensibly. And that its possible to have that level of success without the need to find a billionaire with loose pockets.  Are they a one-off? It's hard to know without knowing what other clubs are being run in a similar manner. Hopefully this is a solid blueprint for us to follow.

 

Might have to give the @BPAS episode with the suppoerts trust another listen.

 

It's really is worth it. It was a good episode. Full of sage advice for us, but also a clear pathway to success. I confess to thinking they had missed their chance last season and thought Kevin (the chap from LTST) was being wishful to think they could replicate it..... but, what did I know. He was right. Their recruitment, headed by Mick Harford, has been exceptional. For example, their big striker that ran Sunderland ragged in the week, called Elijah Adebayo, was signed from Walsall who we were competing against - at the time - in League Two. in fact he scored at BP as we lost 3-2 in Dec '20.

 

Episode thread here:

 

[longtimeblue]

On 5/17/2023 at 3:58 PM, Frankly Mr Shankly said:

Think it's getting easier for a prudent, well-run and stable club to smash through the leagues. Easier than moneybags teams who often squander their investment and traditional 'big clubs' who have been run shambolically, anyway.

 

I think the step up from Championship to Premiership becomes the bigger barrier now, especially given the parachute payments reducing it to the same 3-4 clubs yo-yoing about.

 

Having said that. Personally I'd not enjoy a Premiership return. Or at least, my enjoyment would be tempered massively. 

 

I like the positivity on here in terms of our potential at the moment. For years on this site, people have been saying we're tinpot and destined for sub 4k crowds until eternity.