Luton - The Hatters have a couple of major injury worries for the match against Hartlepool tomorrow. One player who is definitely out is one of last season's flops Richard Langley. Langley picked up an injury in the pre-season match against Rushden & Diamonds, and may even be out for the season. There appears to be no sign that Langley will play this side of Easter anyway. One player whose fortunes are less clear is former Rushden player David Bell. Bell has picked up a thigh injury against Stevenage, and is thought to be 50-50 for the opening day of the season match. The other former Diamond, Paul Underwood, is also still out because of his long-term mystery illness that is keeping him out. Other than that, there don't appear to be any other apparent injuries, and there is a lot of competition for places in the team. In goal is likely to be Dean Brill, as our only other goalkeeper, Marlon Beresford, has apparently been transfer listed. Left-back is likely to be Alan Goodall, because again Sol Davis has apparently been transfer listed, Underwood will probably still be injured and not match fit, and Emanuel isn't very good. Centre-backs should be Chris Coyne and Chris Perry, mainly because the only other clear option for the centre is Keith Keane, and it isn't Keane's strong position anyway. Instead, Keane is more likely to play at right-back, although fellow Ireland U-21 international Kevin Foley should be given the nod ahead of him. Richard Jackson will also be looking for a place in the team, although I'm not really sure which position he plays in.
The midfield is less straightforward. New signings Dave Edwards, Darren Currie and Don Hutchinson will be looking for places in the team, and Paul McVeigh can possibly play in midfield as well. As well as them, there are Matthew Spring, Ahmet Brkovic, Steve Robinson, Keith Keane, Steven O'Leary, and possibly Lewis Emanuel who will be competing for places. It will be even more complicated if David Bell joins the picture, although Bell is likely to start if he is available. At least one of the new midfield signings is going to start, because surely Blackwell won't start with the same midfield that was so bad last season. Spring should start, along with Currie, Edwards and someone else.
Blackwell will also have a selection problem up front as well. New signings Paul McVeigh, Paul Peschisolido and Paul Furlong (why are they all called Paul?) will be competing for places, along with Paul Talbot and Paul Parkin. Peschisolido in particular seemed to impress in pre-season, so he should be in the squad somewhere, and Talbot also scored a few goals. I'm not sure he'll leave someone of Parkin's quality out either, but in reality, your guess is as good as mine.
Hartlepool - For the Hartlepool team news, I have carefully plagiarised the team news from www.hartlepoolutd-mad.co.uk . Please log on to this website for a different preview of the match from me, in which I answer a few questions from the editor of that site. As you can see, the team selection process should be a lot simpler for Danny Wilson.
"Pools
Danny Wilson is likely to have a fully fit squad to choose from after James Brown returned from a dead leg to play against Rotherham last week. Also fully fit and fighting for a first team place are Michael Nelson and Willie Boland.
A fully fit squad gives Danny Wilson a real headache, whether or not he goes for 433 as he has pre-season we will have to wait and see."
The departure of number one keeper Konstantopolous (or something like that) to Coventry is a blow for Hartlepool, and instead either Jan Budtz or Arran Lee-Barrett will play in goal for Hartlepool.
Connections
There are a lot of recent connections between Hartlepool United and Luton Town, mostly involving strikers who are revered at one club and not particularly revered at the other. One man who is popular with both sets of fans is Danny Wilson. The current Hartlepool boss was, of course, the second goalscorer in the 1988 Littlewoods Cup victory against Arsenal, and takes his place in Luton's history books for that. He almost took his place in Hartlepool's history books for being the first manager to guide them to a League title last season, but they were sadly pipped at the post by former Hatter Richard Money, who took Walsall to the title instead. Another manager who just missed out on the League title with Hartlepool is Mike Newell, another former Luton player. He, of course, succeeded with Luton in 2005. Two notable strikers stand out from a Luton point of view in terms of connections. Steve Howard is the first, who cost Joe Kinnear £50,000 in 2001 and scored 100 goals for the club, the second is Adam Boyd, who cost 10 times as much in 2006 and scored twice in one season, although he had much more success downing pints in the local pubs, if rumours are to be believed. Boyd is much more popular with Hartlepool fans though, as I found out when doing the interview on hartlepoolutd-mad.co.uk.
Past Meetings
Luton have only actually played Hartlepool 15 times, including one match in the FA Cup. The record at Kenilworth Road favours Luton, who have won 5 matches out of 7 at home. Hartlepool have won just one, with the other match being drawn. Hartlepool's solitary victory at Kenilworth Road came in 1967, three days after they had beaten us up at Hartlepool, and they won 2-0. The last meeting between the two sides saw Luton take a 3-2 victory up at Hartlepool, with goals from Coyne, Showunmi and Foley in 2005. Earlier that season, goals from Steve Howard, Ahmet Brkovic and Gary McSheffrey saw Luton win 3-0 in the last match at Kenilworth Road between the two sides. Overall, Luton have won 8 matches against Hartlepool, and Pools have won 6 against Luton, with just the one draw.
Prediction
It is easy to say that we are promotion contenders this season, and Hartlepool arguably will be hoping to stay up after winning promotion last season, and with us at home, we should be looking to win this. However, we should remember the first day of the season match two years ago against Crystal Palace, when no one expected Luton to win after gaining promotion, and we won 2-1 at the place that had seen Premiership football the season before. Admittedly, these circumstances are a lot different, but we should beware of the same thing happening to us. We have transformed the team since the disastrous campaign last season, so hopefully our fortunes will be transformed. Hartlepool don't appear to have made too many changes to their team, but do they really need to after last season? I'll predict a 2-1 win for Luton on Saturday, but everything depends on how well our team gel, and if they don't work well together, things will go horribly wrong.