For March 17th I'm going back 9 years to 2012 and York City's FA Trophy Semi-Final 2nd Leg away at Kenilworth Road, Luton.
I always tend to have a problem with clubs whose supporters come prepacked with a sense of entitlement. Followers who expect to win every week and who have no concept that they could get beaten by "the likes of York". There tends to be a lack of respect of other clubs from such fans. I find such attitudes nauseating. It tends to happen mainly when a club has been relegated to a level below that which the fans believe their team should be playing and it's a characteristic that no club is immune from. Typically you will find that supporters of clubs that get relegated out of the Football League will go into their new Non-League surroundings proclaiming that they are "on loan" to Non-League just for the one season. It makes me laugh. These people have no idea of the calibre of the sides that they will be coming up against. Pure ignorance in other words. Realisation tends to dawn after about 5 games.
And so with Luton Town. The club had already been docked 10 points for going into administration in 2007/8 season when they were deducted a further thirty (yes 30!) points from the following season's total for other financial misdemeanours going back several years. If there was a competition for clubs having been deducted the most points then Luton would surely be the winners. I do have sympathy for the view that they were treated more harshly for their misdemeanours than just about every other club but, hey, it's Luton. They crashed out of the Football League at the end of 2008/9 and, you guessed it, their fans were expecting a stroll to the following season's Conference title and a rapid return to the Football League. And so begins the sense of entitlement!
Three years later and rather amusingly, Town were still floundering around near the top of the Conference. Not promoted. Their fans seemed to be ever more entitled and frustrated at every meeting with York and, joyously, York had the indian sign (a curse, hex, hoodoo or jinx) over Luton. It seemed like York couldn't lose to the Hatters (a historical reference to Luton being the home of England's hat-making industry since the 17th century) and didn't their supporters just hate it?
York had already won the first leg of this two-legged FA Trophy Semi-Final at Bootham Crescent by a goal to nil thanks to a Jamie Reed penalty. Luton pressed York hard in the second leg and, when they scored towards the end of the first half through Robbie Wilmott to level up the scores on aggregate, there was only going to be one winner. Wasn't there? Somebody forgot to inform the Minstermen about Luton's rightful passage to the Final and, rather satisfyingly, with time almost up and the clock on 90 minutes, my all-time City favourite and ex-Racing Club Warwick star-turn, Matty Blair popped up with a header to send York to Wembley. It wasn't the last last-minute goal that he was going to score that season but more about that another time...
CRB Match No. 1882
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