Tom Craddock: York play-off defeats were the biggest regrets of my Luton career

Suffering play-off defeat to York City in the 2009-10 season was one of the biggest regrets of former Luton striker Tom Craddock’s career.

After Luton had finished second in the table, 11 points behind Stevenage, the forward was then part of the Hatters side who took on fifth-placed York City, losing 1-0 in both games.

The Minstermen went on to be defeated 3-1 by Oxford United at Wembley, as Craddock said: “That is probably one of the biggest regrets, apart from me leaving the club, not getting through those play-offs as I think we would have definitely beaten Oxford.

“I went to Oxford the next season and we had a much better team than Oxford did.

“If we’d have beaten York, I think we’d have gone up, and it would have been a great day as Oxford would have taken a lot of fans as well, it’s just a shame it never happened.”

Town were clear favourites going into the two-legged tie, having scored 42 goals during their final 13 games of the regular season, including eight against Hayes & Yeading, plus six in wins over Histon, Grays Athletic and Ebbsfleet.

Try as they might though, they couldn’t net in either contest with the Minstermen, Craddock unable to add to his 24 goals that term.

He said: “In the other two games against York in the season, the way they set up, they would play 4-4-2 and make it really difficult (1-1 and 0-0 draws).

“They had decent strikers and good players dotted around, If you look at that York team, quite a few have gone on and had good careers in the Football League.

“So they were a good team, had good players and just the way they set up, we didn’t quite get to grips with it.

“Although in the play-off game at York, the first leg, it could have been three, four, five, six nil to us, it just so happened that the goals had all gone in for us and they wouldn’t this time.

“I think if we’d have got one goal in that play-off first leg, we would have scored three or four, as we really had them on the rack and we had chances.

“It just didn’t go in and sometimes that happens.

“We lost a goal late in the first leg and it helped York as they just came and took no risks and that suited them.”

After entering the season on the back of relegation from League Two, but boosted by a superb Johnstone’s Paint Trophy win over Scunthorpe United at Wembley, Craddock had expected Town to be challenging for the title, especially with some new additions.

It didn't materialise though as despite a brilliant end of season run, they could never haul in Stevenage, who went on to lift the title.

He said: “Going into the season, we’d lost Chris (Martin) who had gone back on loan to Norwich, but we had got some really good players in.

“Adam Newton, Mark Tyler, Andy Burgess and then Alan White came in from Darlington, so we went into the season with a really strong squad, not having lost many players and making some fantastic new additions.

“Because we’d had a pretty decent end to the season, we’d won the JPT, there was a lot of expectation on us and I think maybe just the mentality, we knew it would be tough, but we didn’t realise how good some of the teams were.

“There were probably, six, seven, eight really good teams, but the problem was, because they were coming to Luton, they raised their game and we found it tough at first.

“It wasn’t through the want of thinking ‘we were better,’ it was just adapting because there would been no pressure or expectation on us the season before.

“For me personally it was just getting used to that difference.

"We had a decent start, then we had a bad run and we were just starting to come out of it when the club decided to make a change and replace Mick (Harford) with Richard (Money).

“That just sort of prolonged that dip a bit as Richard wanted to make his own changes.

“But then when we came out of it and went on that big run, that showed what we were capable of, it just took us longer than expected to go on that run and by that time Stevenage were far ahead of us.

“It was just more of a mentality thing and going into the unknown, but once we got our heads round that, we showed we were more than capable of winning it and I think in a number of seasons, we’d have gone up with the amount of points we got.”

Craddock had hoped to have a second crack at trying to bring league football back to the Hatters the following campaign, but like a number of players, he left the club, heading to Oxford in the transfer window.

Had Town kept a similar squad, he felt they would have earned their place back quicker than the four seasons it eventually took.

He added: “The most disappointing thing for me was that we didn’t keep that team together for the next season, for whatever reasons, the team got broken up and then they changed manager, changed manager again.

“I think if we have kept that team for the next season and just been left alone, I’m 99.9 per cent sure we’d have gone up, as we had a real good dressing room.

“Everyone got on well, it was just a shame the team got broken up, that’s football and it happens doesn’t it?”