Championship Playoff: A Long Awaited Return

Who doesn’t love a football fairytale?

We now know that over the Bank Holiday Weekend it’ll be between Coventry City and Luton Town for the final spot in the Premier League next season. But what makes this match so special? Both teams’ stories.

While neither team are strangers to the top division of football, it’s been a long time since either have been in the most elite league in England. For Coventry City, their 34-year run in the top division was ended in the 2000-01 Premier League season. The team’s decline through the leagues would continue over the following years, even falling down to League Two in 2017.

The end of that season though saw the start in a change of fortune. They would win the EFL Trophy and a strong run of form near the end – while not enough to see them get out of relegation – did see them take 13 points from a possible 24 in the last eight games.

An immediate promotion came in the following season via the playoffs, and a few years later their promotion back to the Championship came with the most unique of methods – becoming League One Champions as a result of a points-per-game system calculating a number of cancelled matches as a result of the COVID pandemic.

Now, their comeback to the Premier League is just one game away. But facing them is a team who’ve never been in the Premiership before.

If anything, Luton Town’s story is even more incredible. Having been relegated in the last season of Division One before its rebranding to the Premier League, it’s now been 31 years since the Hatters were last in the top division of football.

Luton then spent the next 15 years tumbling down and climbing up the leagues, but in 2007 – while in the Championship – the club suffered from a number of financial irregularities, and three consecutive relegations saw the club drop to non-League football for half a decade, only returning to League Two in 2014.

Back-to-back promotions saw Luton return to the Championship in 2019, and their continued growth now sees them in the Championship playoff final against Coventry City.

Either way, a 22 or 31 year streak is about to end – and it’s going to be nice to see a fresh face in the Premier League. But who will it be? Make sure you show your support for your team with our exclusive range of Coventry City and Luton Town designs in store!

Ashley
Return of the… who?