Kenilworth Road

As far as Away Days go, Kenilworth Road is now up there with my all-time favourite trips. On this occasion, it was the final game of the season - Luton Town were in with a real chance of reaching the play-offs and Reading had nothing to play for, having avoided relegation with a few games to spare.

We didn't travel to the game expecting to get any points but as is customary for our final away game, it's inflatables day so the atmosphere is always a lot of fun.

The Journey

Luton's not the furthest journey and from Reading, it's pretty quick. From Eastbourne though, I was looking at about 3.5 hours on the train and with it being an early (12:30pm) kick off, I was ready early and on the 7:06am departure. With a change at Haywards Heath and another train through the centre of London (and the iconic London skyline causing so many memories to come flooding back), my train journey terminated at Harpenden in good time.

You'll notice that my train didn't go to Luton... As is customary for a British train journey, you don't get to travel solely by train and instead, get the pleasure of a replacement bus service. And as is customary for a football away day in England, by 10:30am as football fans are getting off a train, they're pissed off their tits and making proper dicks of themselves. So much so, that the security at Harpenden train station asked the Reading fans to stand to one side and gave them a bus to themselves.

As a Reading fan myself, the prospect of sitting on a bus full of pissed up 15 year olds didn't appeal to me, so I waited patiently with the non-dick heads.

Train and Bus journey to Luton Town

Welcome to Luton

When I finally arrived in Luton in what was a fairly unexciting journey, I searched for some food and found the most amazing Sainsbury's I'd ever been to. At their pizza counter, they had plenty of half price pizzas and I bought a 14" meat feast for just £2.25 (roughly 8 STEEM). An uncooked pizza's not much use though and this is where the amazing part kicks in - for just £1 (roughly 3 STEEM) more, they would cook it for me. A fully cooked, 14" meat feast pizza for £3.25 (roughly 11 STEEM) - bargain! And to delight @eosxiomara, here's a photo of it.

Pre-Match

Wondering if the day could get any better, I made my way to Kenilworth Road where I discovered the most bizarre football ground I'd ever been to - given that I've ticked off more than 70 grounds now, that's quite something. It's been a long time since I've asked "is that the ground?" and meant it but this was one of those occasions. Making my way around to the away end, the entrance was located between 2 front doors where the residents had presumably sold off their living room and kitchen to allow access through their house into the ground.

Away Entrance to Kenilworth Road

I also wondered what the situation was with their back gardens and it turns out that apart from these 2 houses, they still had one.

Gardens on Kenilworth Road

Not exactly a sun trap and quite simply, bizarre.

What was also bizarre is that having travelled all that way for "inflatables day", the Luton stewards had decided that inflatables were not permitted inside the ground. The word "unimpressed" doesn't quite cut it. Neither do the words "kill joys". Fortunately, some still got in, including the blow up doll you'll see in my first photo. The customary inflatable penis and full sized rubber dingy didn't make it though ☹️

Inflatables at Luton Town

Due to the importance of the game for Luton and the lure of inflatables for Reading, the ground was a sell out with both sets of fans in good spirits. The usual rendition of "Sweet Caroline" by the Reading fans...

...was bettered by some moves, the likes of which I haven't seen since my clubbing days...

The Match

By the time the match kicked off, I already knew that I'd be going home a happy man. My pizza, the spectacular ground and the dancing had made my day already but I had 90 minutes of football to watch first.

From kick off, Luton should have been ahead. Cameron Jerome (who caused problems throughout the game) placing a one-on-one straight into Nyland's arms and soon after, Allan Campbell put a free header straight at the keeper again. After these early scares, it was a fairly even match with neither side looking particularly dangerous.

Then a moment, worthy of winning any match. On the stroke of half time, Nyland was waiting to distribute the ball and taking far too long for my liking. A Luton player was standing behind him and the feeling that Nyland didn't know he was there started to grow stronger. Too far back to be heard, my screams of "MAN ON" went unnoticed... Nyland threw the ball in front of him to kick it, allowing Harry Cornick to take control of the ball and score the easiest goal of his career.

Source

You had to laugh but if we had anything to play for, nobody would have been laughing. How the keeper didn't notice, or why one of his team mates didn't tell him I'll never know.

This was the only goal in a 1-0 win for Luton - their play-off spot confirmed and a miserable season for Reading F.C. complete in what felt like an appropriate finish. Unlike at Kidderminster, the police were ready for a pitch invasion - not that I bothered hanging around to see it, knowing that I had a bus and a couple of trains to endure on my way home.