Tahith Chong leaves for Blues for Luton Town
Tahith Chong leaves for Blues for Luton Town
Blues can confirm the departure of Tahith Chong.
He joins Luton Town for an undisclosed fee, after spending the past two seasons at Birmingham City.
The Curacao-born attacker initially arrived on loan from Manchester United for 2021/22 and, within five weeks of the campaign beginning, was twice named man of the match by Sky Sports for his performances against Sheffield United and Derby County.
Unfortunately, an injury sustained in training would keep him on the sidelines for four months, but he marked his return in March 2022 by scoring his first senior goal to set Blues on course for three points away at Bristol City.
Following a return to his parent club for pre-season, he signed permanently from the Red Devils on deadline day last August and went on to feature in more than 80% of Birmingham City’s Sky Bet Championship fixtures as John Eustace’s side claimed the Club’s highest points tally for six seasons.
Chong departs having made 60 appearances for Birmingham, scoring five goals and contributing eight assists.
He joins a Luton side who are managed by Rob Edwards and are preparing for their first top-flight season since 1991/92, having earned promotion to the Premier League through the Sky Bet Championship play-offs this May.
Good luck, Tahith!
Hatters chairman reveals Luton have approval to rearrange Burnley match if Kenilworth Road isn’t ready
Luton chairman David Wilkinson has revealed that the Hatters have approval to rearrange their opening home game of the Premier League season against Burnley should Kenilworth Road not be ready in time.
Following their promotion to the top flight via the Championship play-off final, the club have been undergoing what chief executive Gary Sweet labelled as an ‘insane’ task of having to completely rebuild the Bobbers Stand at a cost of around £12m in the space of about 14 weeks to meet top flight requirements.
They include a number of new facilities needed for broadcasting top flight fixtures, plus camera positions for VAR, with Town also having to upgrade their floodlights too.
Luton travel to Brighton on the opening day of the campaign, as they are then due to host Vincent Kompany’s Clarets, who won the second tier last term on Saturday, August 19.
After that, Town travel to Chelsea, with their next home game against West Ham United, which has now been moved to Friday, September 1, although could switch again to Sunday, September 3 depending on the date of the Hatters’ yet to be drawn Carabao Cup second round clash.
Speaking to Talk TV about the chances of completion in time to face Burnley, Wilkinson said: “I think we will be ready, we’re ahead of schedule, but that’s as far as I know.
“We have permission if we need to, to rearrange it.
“We got approval for the first game to be away and the possibility of the second if we need to, to be rearranged.”
Like CEO Sweet has already done, Wilkinson also went on to praise the Premier League for their assistance in letting Luton know exactly what needed to be done in getting their stadium up to scratch even before they reached the top division.
He continued: “They’ve been very helpful, the Premier League have been very helpful with the changes we’re making.
“They came in very early, they came in in January as any club who was in danger of being in the play-offs was looked at.
“They come and say ‘well your floodlights aren’t strong enough, and you need this, you need that.’
“There’s all sorts of extra media requirements which we wouldn’t have had in the Championship, and of course, apart from the 50 cameras for the media, you’ve got VAR and all those things that need to be done.
“They come in very early and tell you what you’ve got to do and we had it last year, as we were in the play-offs last year, so we had a clue as to what was going to be required this year.
“It’s been helpful and they’ve been helpful all the way through.
“They bring their various groups to the club and help you organise yourself for the Premier League.”
Explaining just what has been going on to the 118-year-old ground and where the club are with the developments, Wilkinson added: “The boxes have now gone and there is a new stand being built on what is the old stand, the Bobbers stand, which I used to stand on in the early days of going there.
“We’ve had to put up new floodlight pylons because ours weren’t strong enough for media.
“We’re having to put in huge media facilities, we’ve got to have room for 50 fixed camera positions which if you can imagine in Kenilworth Road, is about the whole stadium!
“Of course all the room for the trucks and everything that comes with it, but we’re doing it.”
