Embo not good enough for Grays Athletic first team

In 2002 the Hatters celebrated promotion from the old 3rd division to the old 2nd division with what was then a record number of points for Luton Town FC. However, much of the squad has sadly been broken up in the three years since. Kevin Nicholls, Chris Coyne, Russell Perrett, Ahmet Brkovic, Steve Howard and Peter Holmes are amongst those who have stayed and have played a vital part in this seasons title success. Paul Hughes is also still under contract with the Town but has mysteriously disappeared. Of the others, Matthew Taylor is playing Premiership football with Portsmouth, Emmerson Boyce played Premiership football last year at Crystal Palace, Matthew Spring has moved to Leeds United, Adrian Forbes has experienced promotion with Swansea City this season and Jean-Louis Valois has been released by Burnley this year via Hearts. Dean Crowe and Mark Ovendale have both disappeared from football without trace, and before Sunday it was suspected that the same thing had happened to Carl Emberson.

However, yours truly can exclusively report that Embo hasn't disappeared but can now be found warming the bench at Grays Athletic, recently proclaimed champions of the Nationwide Conference South division. Carl could only sit and watch as ex-Lincoln keeper Ashley Bayes kept out Russell Cooke's penalty to win the FA Trophy for Grays Athletic against Hucknall Town at Villa Park on Sunday. It's only one step down for Carl - three years ago he was part of the Luton team that lost in the Worthington Cup against Aston Villa, and on that occasion he actually played. Sadly for Carl, he could only sit and watch as Ashley Bayes gave a goalkeeping performance that he can only dream about. Also in the team was Dean Brennan, one of Ricky Hill's signings during his ill-fated time as Luton boss. He played at right-back for Grays, making some good runs and scored the sixth penalty in the shootout but his overall performance didn't show Joe Kinnear that he was wrong to release him.

The star of the show was Grays Athletic's John Martin, who produced some passes, runs and shots which were Steve Robinson-esque during the match, and it was him that put Grays Athletic 1-0 up. Dennis Oli, an ex-QPR player, was mainly responsible for the goal,showing pace like Matthew Taylor. An ex-Luton trainee by the name of Joe Bruce was an unused sub for the Kent outfit. For those of you interested, the shoot-out finished 6-5 to Grays, with Hucknall missing two and Grays missing the one. Vill Powell, an ex-Sheffield Wednesday trainee similar to Enoch Showunmi, except a smaller version and without the talent, missed the Grays penalty. The overall attendance was 8116, with at least 2 Luton fans.