Naismith insists football is the 'greatest game in the world' after Royals drama
Hatters hit back from 3-1 down to triumph at Reading
A jubilant Luton skipper Kal Naismith declared that football was the ‘greatest game in the world’ after running the gauntlet of emotions during Saturday’s brilliant comeback victory at Reading.
The Town captain saw his side get off to the perfect start through Jake Richards’ early goal, only to then be responsible for the Royals’ instant leveller, when his backpass sold Josh Keeley short, Jack Marriott sliding in to score. The ex-Hatter had a hat-trick before the break too, netting from range when, allowed to shoot by Hakeem Odoffin, his effort somehow beat Keeley, before Naismith went to ground expecting to win a foul that never came after being pushed by Kyreece Lisbie, Marriott eventually found unmarked inside the area to net his third.
Trailing 3-1 at the interval, the second period saw Town come flying out of the blocks, level within eight minutes through two Kasey Palmer strikes, the first a volley into the ground which beat Royals stopper Joel Pereira, the midfielder then finishing off a wonderful team move having been picked out by Nahki Wells’ inch-perfect pass moments later. Play did then calm down somewhat, before a breathless passage of play in stoppage time saw substitute Gideon Kodua win it, slamming into the net from close range.
It led a buoyant Naismith to say afterwards: “What a game! It was full of emotions and I said last week after the Gillingham game we’re back where we left off, but it’s more like that, last season, we were down, we were down a lot of points, and then we felt every emotion in that last game of last season (3-2 win at Bolton) and we just carried on. The lads just never know when we’re beat.
"We knew at half time we could come back, we were saying it, but it’s one thing saying it, it’s coming out here as players and putting on that performance in the second half is incredible. I was just saying in there, football’s the greatest game in the world. The Reading players might not be feeling like that right now, but it’s just the greatest game in the world. It takes you places, I’ve been in it a long time and that feeling when Gids score, it’s unbelievable.”
Asked if he had always believed that Town had it in them to win it when they moved into extra time with the scores level at 3-3, and the likes of Kodua, Callum Marshall and Benny Benagr all now on the pitch, Naismith continued: “I did, I thought we need to stay solid. I also thought when we went 3-3, we dropped off a little bit, we dropped too deep, you could see what they were doing, they were putting two up top, they were kicking the ball and going forward a lot.
"We were a bit too deep and when you’re that deep, if they win a duel, it can fall anywhere. I just felt like we dropped off a bit, but when the nine minutes went up I just thought that was a lot of time, be patient, I knew we were going to get a chance. When you see our subs coming on, Benny, brilliant, Gids, Callum, it falls to Gids and he does what he does.”
It was the same for a mystic boss Jack Wilshere too, as his team talk during the break which has since been released on the club’s social media channels, showed him castigating his team for gifting yet another Reading player a hat-trick, having done so with Kelvin Ehibhatiomhan in a galling 3-2 loss at Kenilworth Road last term, before telling Town’s squad in no uncertain terms they could also definitely score twice in 10 minutes.
Having predicted that could happen meant he wasn’t too surprised when it actually did, adding: “That was my message at half time, we have to do certain things better, but we’re still in this because the spaces are there. We had so much control, but we have to turn that control into threat, into danger and have a little bit of creation with that.
"I know this group, I know that we’ve got good players, I know Kasey can create something, I know we can open up teams and get behind them. I thought we did that in the first half and then missed a pass or didn’t put the right ball into the box, so if we were cleaner in the final third i knew we’d get some opportunities.”