As a boyhood Chelsea fan who identifies Frank Lampard as his hero growing up, Luton Town winger Harry Cornick is all too aware of the devastating role he could play in tomorrow’s FA Cup meeting at Stamford Bridge. But it’s safe to say he doesn’t mind.
Asked about the prospect of scoring Luton’s winner and piling the pressure on Chelsea’s manager, Cornick replied: “That sounds perfect to me. That’s exactly what I want to do. You’re playing for the team you play for, I don’t want Chelsea to win. No chance. Hopefully I can score the winner and knock them out the cup. That’d be lovely.”
Cornick, a self-confessed “glory fan” who owns Chelsea shirts with Drogba and Zola on the back, has backed Lampard to turn the club’s form around and secure a top-four finish, but having watched their dip in form from afar the 25-year-old believes Luton are capable of inflicting more misery on a side who have lost five of their last eight Premier League games.
“We’ve got enough in our squad to cause them a lot of problems,” Cornick added. “It will be a tough place to go to, but they’re a team that’s going to be under a bit of pressure, they need a result. We have to use that against them.
“We’ll play our own game and go there with confidence. I think we’ve got a great chance of getting a result. If Luton get a win at Stamford Bridge, it’ll be all over the papers, so we have to look at it as a massive chance to get a scalp in the FA Cup and create some history for Luton Town.”
Beyond Cornick, the connections continue in the form of Mick Harford, the current Luton assistant and head of recruitment who during his playing days scored Chelsea’s first ever Premier League goal back in 1992.
It was a point which left Luton manager Nathan Jones with his head in his hands as he joked: “Don’t get Mick started about Chelsea… We try to keep Mick’s Chelsea chat to an absolute minimum.”
But behind the joviality of yesterday’s media interviews, it was clear this Luton side – who secured three promotions in five years to reach the Championship in 2019 – fancy their chances tomorrow.
Hatters wary of a wounded Chelsea
Jones pointed out they ran Manchester United close before two late goals saw them lose 3-0 in the League Cup earlier this season, and while the Chelsea match is another reminder of the calibre of fixtures they used to play in their old Division One days from 1982 to 1992, it also serves as an occasion they hope will soon become the norm again.
“It’s not an ordinary one, though it’s one we’d like to be a regular occurrence,” Jones said. “It will be my first visit there but one I’m relishing. I’m really looking forward to the test.”
On the prospect of pushing Lampard closer to the exit door at Chelsea, Jones added: “It could be the worst fixture they could have or probably one of the better ones.
“Five weeks ago he wasn’t [under pressure] and in five weeks’ time he might not be. Whatever happens, they’re an extremely talented team so it’s going to be a massive task. We have to make sure we’re the best versions of ourselves. We have to hopefully find a chink in their armour and exploit it.
“This isn’t a Chelsea side hammering teams and top of the league, but we also know football can turn, and in five weeks this could be the Chelsea team that clicks. We don’t want to be the team they found their form against.”
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