Message sent to Luton Town owners amid relegation uncertainty | OneFootball

FLW's Hatters fan pundit wants to see the club's owners be more open with supporters

This article is part of Football League World's 'Terrace Talk' series, which provides personal opinions from our FLW Fan Pundits regarding the latest breaking news, teams, players, managers, potential signings and more...

Luton Town's owners have been urged to be more open and transparent with supporters about the Hatters' financial concerns as they face a potential successive relegation to League One this season.

The Hatters were battling hard to stay up in the Premier League this time last year, but 12 months on, they are on track to suffer another relegation to the third tier, with recently appointed manager Matt Bloomfield mostly unable to stem the tide of their consistently poor performances.

Luton were widely tipped to be the best of the top-flight relegated teams in the Championship, but the club currently sit second-bottom of the second tier with nine games of the season left. Their recent midweek win against Cardiff City has given supporters hope of survival, but many questions will still need to be asked of the owners and directors regardless of whether they stay up this season.

Message sent to Luton Town owners

Luton Town are owned by fan-backed consortium 2020 Holdings, who are headed by club chairman and lifelong supporter David Wilkinson. Their current chief executive officer, Gary Sweet, was a founding member and former director of the Luton Town Supporters' Trust, which is a cooperative that acts as a majority shareholder of the club.

Those current chiefs have overseen some of the best years in the Hatters' history in recent times, with the club going from non-league to the Premier League in 10 seasons from 2013/14 to 2023/24, but their outstanding work has been somewhat diminished by this season's failures that could see them fall back into the third-tier.

FLW's Luton fan pundit Simon Holden believes that his club's owners have not been transparent enough throughout their struggles this season and thinks that they need to start being more open with supporters about finances going forward.

“The owners of our club have not been very transparent ever since we got promoted to the Premier League,” Simon told FLW.

“Gary Sweet did release a note saying that they haven’t been communicating well enough, and it’s something they are looking to address. Whether that ends up happening remains to be seen.

“I would love a bit more transparency from them. Regardless of what happens this season, whether we stay up or go down, there needs to be a full inquiry into what has happened and why.

“(They need to) make sure that the club gets the best use of the money that’s now around our club. If it’s all going into the stadium, I would love for the owners to tell us this.”

Relegation from the Championship would be a disaster for Luton's owners

Nobody connected to Luton would have expected this season to play out how it has, not least the likes of chairman Wilkinson or CEO Sweet, who likely could not believe their luck when Rob Edwards masterminded their promotion to the top-flight nearly two years ago.

They are now staring down the barrel of a shock consecutive drop into the third tier and ex-Wycombe boss Matt Bloomfield has been trusted with the reins as they look to climb to safety over the next six weeks.

Hatters chairman Wilkinson has previously emphasised his desire for the club to "play the long game" in terms of having a long-term vision and a plan for success.

Their main off-pitch project right now is building a new stadium, with the 25,000-capacity Power Court arena set to be opened in time for 2027/28, but they need to get their short-term aims in check before anything like that becomes a priority.

CEO Sweet also spoke in December of the club's plans for "when" they return to the Premier League, which could no doubt happen again at some point, but feels like a while off right now given their current fortunes.

It almost feels as if lots of Luton's aims following relegation from the top flight were too focused on the years to come, as safety from the drop this season felt like a foregone conclusion for many, with a promotion battle thought to be on the cards.

Their current reality is far from those predictions, however, and fans have been left disillusioned with their decisions off the pitch and the relatively poor squad that has been left for Bloomfield.