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FEATURE: Where is the Luton team that played Coventry in League 2 now?
It’s safe to say that back in March 2018, neither Luton Town nor Coventry City were unduly worried about making the Premier League.
When the two teams met at what was then called the Ricoh Arena, the Hatters were second in League Two with the Sky Blues trying to press for a place in that season’s play-offs.
A 2-2 draw would see neither side take the decisive three point haul, but at the end of the campaign, both would take a promotion. Luton would end the season in second place, while Coventry would beat Exeter in the play-off final.
Five years on, Luton and Coventry will take on one another in the high-stakes contest that is the Championship play-off final. Whomever wins will be in the Premier League next season, concluding a remarkable story that will have seen the winner go from 4th to 1st tier in 5 years and end a long absence from the top tier (since 1992 in Luton’s case and 2001 in Coventry’s).
To re-wind back to those at the start of such a journey, where is the Luton team who travelled to Coventry that afternoon in 2018 now?
GK – Marek Stech
This was Stech’s first season at Kenilworth Road after moving from Sparta Prague the previous summer. The Czech would be named in the PFA Team of the Year for his work in 2017/18 as Luton got promoted, but lost his place to James Shea the following campaign and made no appearances at all in 2019/20. He has been without a club since leaving Mansfield in 2022.
RB – Jack Stacey
Signed from Reading in the summer of 2017, Stacey quickly established himself as a first choice, making close to 100 appearances with the Hatters. The defender would win the club’s Young Player of the Year prize in his first campaign and Player of the Year in his second, before moving onwards to Bournemouth in 2019. Stacey remains with the Cherries, playing more often than not in his first three years but struggling for game time this year.
CB – Scott Cuthbert
This would be the final one of Cuthbert’s three campaigns at Kenilworth Road, with the club captain coming back at this period after a mid-season injury. Cuthbert made over 100 appearances but was released at the end of the 2017/18 season with the League 2 job done. After 4 seasons with Stevenage, he now plays for Woking in the National League.
CB – Alan Sheehan
Cuthbert’s centre-back partner would be the team’s Player of the Year for his work helping Luton win promotion in this campaign, with his third campaign at Kenilworth Road seeing him established as a regular pick. In the next two seasons, however, Sheehan fell down the pecking order and left in January 2020. After spells with Lincoln, Northampton and Oldham, Sheehan returned to Kenilworth Road as a coach, before following Nathan Jones to and consequently out of Southampton earlier this season.
LB – Dan Potts
Somebody who remains in the Luton fold right now. Potts joined Luton from West Ham in 2015 after being released by West Ham and the-now 29-year-old remains a regular when fit for the Hatters at this stage of their journey. He made 23 appearances this season, though his availability was hampered by a few injury spells.
CM – Flynn Downes
The 2017/18 campaign was a big one for Downes, who made his professional debut for Ipswich earlier that season before joining Luton on loan for the second half of the campaign. Downes would establish himself as a regular at Ipswich before leaving for Swansea City in 2021, and then onwards to his boyhood club West Ham last summer, for whom he has featured heavily in the Europa Conference League.
CM – Glen Rea
Rea was one of Jones’ first signings at Luton in 2016 and until the 2020/21 season was a regular pick at Kenilworth Road, racking up over 200 appearances in all competitions for the club. However, injury has compromised his availability and the player has had a few loan moves away. The Brighton-born former Irish youth international spent the second half of this season on loan with League 1’s Cheltenham Town.
CM – Luke Berry
One of the members of the squad still turning out for Luton now, Berry suffered a major injury a few weeks after the Coventry game but has come back to still be a regular in the Luton fold. The midfielder, who joined Luton from Cambridge in 2017, scored 3 Championship goals this season to help the Hatters’ promotion cause.
FW – Harry Cornick
Until January of this year, Cornick had still been around at Kenilworth Road. The attacker would be a regular in his first four seasons at the club, helping Luton to their back-to-back promotions, great escape and first play-off run. After making over 230 appearances, Cornick left on deadline day in January to move to Bristol City.
FW – Danny Hylton
Hylton would make a very positive impression after leaving Oxford to sign for Luton in 2016, scoring 21 goals in each of his first two seasons to help Luton first reach the play-offs and then win promotion. But a major injury in the 2018/19 season would see Hylton struggle for game-time at Luton thereafter, and his association with Luton came to an end in 2022. He now plays for Northampton Town.
FW – James Collins
Collins’ time at Kenilworth Road would be productive, as he registered 20 goals in his first season to help Luton to promotion, another 25 as another promotion followed, and then a decent chunk of more goals in Luton’s first two Championship seasons. His work at Luton would also earn him call ups to the Irish national team. Collins left to join Cardiff in 2021, and then left Cardiff for Derby in 2022.
Sub 1 – Elliot Lee
Playing in the Luton fold at the time along his brother Olly, Elliot Lee was in a second spell with Luton after previously joining on loan in 2015. Lee’s second stint saw him play more often than note in the back-to-back promotion winning seasons, before game time became harder to come by. After loans at Oxford and Charlton, Lee left Luton for big-spending Wrexham, making the National League Team of the Year for his work this season.
Sub 2 – Luke Gambin
London-born Maltese international Gambin joined from Barnet in January 2017 but would largely be a squad player option in his time at the club, though his use was seen in this game with an assist for Luton’s late equaliser. Gambin left Luton in 2019, and after time with Colchester and Malta-based Hamrun Spartans, he spent the season just gone at Sutton United, though he will leave the club this summer.
Subs not used – James Shea, James Justin, Johnny Mullins, Jake Jervis, Olly Lee
Shea’s first season saw him behind Stech in the pecking order for the most part, but this would be flipped in League One for the following campaign. Shea remains on the books at Luton, though has spent this season largely as back-up to Ethan Horvath.
Justin would enjoy a profitable rise from Luton’s academy to first team regular, which would earn him admiring glances from divisions above. He would move to the Premier League in 2019 when he signed for Leicester, before ultimately earning an England international cap in 2022, though his time at the King Power Stadium has been blighted by multiple long-term injuries.
Defender Mullins was in his second year at Kenilworth Road but would be allowed out at the end of the campaign, and after a single year at Cheltenham Town, the defender decided to bail out of playing football at age 33 in the summer of 2019.
Jervis would struggle for game time after moving from Plymouth to Luton in January 2018, and after loans out of the club with first AFC Wimbledon and then Salford City, he has been on a tour outside the English football ecosystem. Jervis first spent two years in Finland with SJK, and is now playing for East Bengal in the Indian Super League.
This would be a rare game in the season where Olly Lee was not utilised, with the midfielder making 43 appearances in all competitions in his third and ultimately final season at the club, in a game that also saw him score the league’s Goal of the Season. Lee ended the campaign by moving to Hearts in Scotland, before joining Gillingham on first a loan and then permanent basis. Lee announced his retirement earlier this year.
