Ég er eiginlega of sár til að skrifa neitt af viti um 30 mínusstigin sem búið er að skella á Luton. Nick Owen, stjórnarformaður félagsins gerir þessu vel skil í grein í The Times. Lesið:
This is an unfair judgement for Luton Town and its fans
In September it will be 50 years since my father first took me to watch Luton Town draw 1-1 with Leeds United. I have been fortunate to be a presenter of World Cup finals and Olympics Games, I have commentated from fantastic places, but nothing churns my stomach and generates more undying passion and excitement than walking through the gates at Kenilworth Road.
Luton is in my blood, I spend my life chatting to our fans, travelling to matches home and away – the club are the heartbeat and focal point of the community. As is the case with Blackburn, Rochdale and Burnley, and similar towns, Luton is most identified by the football club. People remember Luton for David Pleat charging across Maine Road in a beige suit to celebrate staying in the top flight; the support of Eric Morecambe, one of the best comedians of our generation; Andy Dibble’s one-handed penalty save that inspired winning the League Cup in 1988; and producing great players, such as Ricky Hill, the Stein brothers and Bruce Rioch.
So beginning next season with minus 30 points in the bottom division is hard to swallow. We are shattered by the Football League’s decision to award a 20-point penalty if the club want to play in Coca-Cola League Two next season, on top of the ten points that were docked by the FA for misconduct charges. It is so harsh and my thoughts on those people who have made the decision this week are unprintable. But they seem to be the only people in football who consider this justice. You wonder what they are trying to do – are they trying to force us out of existence? This is not only about Luton. Bournemouth and Rotherham United, who are in administration, face a similar predicament.
We have done everything possible to exit administration in a fair and transparent way. But Revenue & Customs refused to accept a cut in the money that it was owed while “football creditors†– the players and other clubs – are paid in full, as Football League rules require. That means that a Company Voluntary Arrangement (CVA), which is required by the League, could not be agreed, leading to a points deduction.
So the Football League rules are, it seems, impossible to fulfil and it needs to look again at its insolvency regulation. When clubs are struggling, being flattened by a mallet does not help. We accepted and expected a sanction, but 20 points is breathtaking. It is a kick in the face for the fans who have supported the club mostly through thin and thin in recent times and us who have come in to help the club.
Luton Town Football Club 2020’s investors have put in £1million to keep the club afloat during its administration, while the original consortium members – Gary Sweet, Stephen Browne, Antony Brown – have worked tirelessly for no money. The complex document applying for exiting administration, for instance, is 450 pages long.
The penalty seems so unjust and mean-spirited and devoid of understanding of what makes football fans tick. We are being punished for something that we are not responsible for. The League is not to blame for the club’s mess, but it is sad that it is not being more supportive to get Luton out of it.
We wanted to come out of administration in April, but the League was dealing with Leeds United’s fight against their points deduction. Had we been able to, we could have had the points deducted from our total last season.
When Leeds were deducted ten points at the end of the 2006-07 season, the penalty did not hurt them because they were already relegated. They received a 15-point deduction last season because they could not complete a CVA. We are being treated more harshly, yet we have smaller debts and will be the new owners. They had the same owner taking them in and out of administration. The League could have suspended or backdated any deduction we received.
It is a great privilege, if very stressful, to be involved in the club’s future. In four years’ time we hope to have a stadium that will be remembered for hosting wonderful football, as we played in the 1980s, not the horrendous stuff going on now.
Nick Owen is the chairman of Luton Town Football Club 2020, Luton Town’s prospective next owner, and he is the main presenter of BBC’s Midlands Today