Luton's big win at home gave them their first league victory, which relieved the fans and silenced the media.
Since Luton won the FA Cup, mainstream media has always liked to focus on this League One team—they are the most special League One team because no League One team gets to play in the Europa League.
Compared to last season, Luton's media pressure is much greater, but Gao Bo has no time to consider these things now.
This season's schedule is too dense.
League, Europa League, League Cup, FA Cup, and the EFL Trophy. Such a dense schedule forces Gao Bo to consider the team's fitness issues.
After a big win at home against Hartlepool on August 22nd, the second round of the League Cup started immediately on August 25th, just three days later.
This time, Luton's luck in the draw was not good, as they drew an away game against Premier League team Blackburn!
Recently, the games have basically been at a pace of one every three days, which made Gao Bo consider the team's physical condition. Moreover, with so many cup games, Gao Bo had to make some trade-offs.
The focus of this season is still the league and the Europa League. Luton is not a big team, and Gao Bo is well aware that wanting everything may ultimately result in nothing. Therefore, after careful consideration, Gao Bo decided to rotate the main players in this game—Gao Bo was prepared to give up the League Cup.
Gao Bo is a very decisive person. Since he was going to give up, he would give up completely.
In this game, Gao Bo sent up substitute players. He even transferred a few players from the reserve team.
Facing Blackburn with such a lineup, and the opponent was a Premier League team, Luton's away loss was expected.
The game was full of twists and turns. Luton took the lead early through a counterattack.
Before the game started, Gao Bo had guaranteed the starting players that as long as they won this game, they would play in the League Cup games in the future.
However, Blackburn ultimately had the advantage in strength. They launched a desperate counterattack in the second half and scored two goals in a row to reverse the game, which also led to Luton's elimination from the League Cup.
Gao Bo didn't feel regretful about being eliminated from the League Cup, but such a result was still very cruel for the players who had fought for the entire game.
Gao Bo comforted the players on the field one by one. He was very satisfied with the fighting spirit shown by the substitutes.
After this game, on August 28th, the day after the Champions League draw, the 2009-10 season Europa League group stage draw was held in Monaco.
This was something Luton was really paying more attention to.
In fact, the players introduced this season largely value the Europa League stage.
Not to mention Sandro, his work permit was stuck. Although Mendes exerted his influence in Portugal, his Portuguese passport was still in the process, and the special genius clause on the England side seemed to be stuck there for a long time without any news.
If he couldn't get his work permit before the transfer window closed, Sandro could only play in the Europa League in the first half of the season. Without a work permit, he couldn't play in any games under the FA.
Griezmann was also paying attention to the Europa League draw. In the past few games, Gao Bo has established him as the core of the forward attack. This role made Griezmann very grateful to Gao Bo. A young player who was still playing for Real Sociedad B team before was immediately entrusted with important tasks after coming to the team. This was something Griezmann didn't expect.
However, with Gao Bo's encouragement, Griezmann really didn't doubt his strength, especially the big win in the previous league game, which completely made Griezmann full of confidence. He can adapt here, he can adapt to the English league.
And the Europa League stage is undoubtedly a bigger stage than the English League One. Griezmann is eager to show his strength here.
There were two English teams participating in the Europa League draw this time—Everton and Luton.
Originally, England had three Europa League spots, but Aston Villa was eliminated by Rapid Vienna in the qualifying round.
In the end, Luton was drawn into Group E. They will be in the same group as Roma from the Italian Serie A, Basel from the Swiss Super League, and CSKA Sofia from the Bulgarian League.
After the results of this group came out, the English media believed that Luton might be able to fight for second place in the group.
Roma is undoubtedly the strongest team in this group. There is basically no problem for them to qualify. CSKA Sofia is the weakest team in the group. The English media believes that Luton's biggest competitor is Basel.
However, for the other three opponents in the group, they are probably regarding Luton as the weakest team in the group. After all, Luton is only a third-tier English team.
"We need to carefully study the situation of the group. The three opponents in this group are not weak teams. We will take it seriously!"
Gao Bo didn't say too much in front of the reporters' microphones because the team's game tasks were still very heavy.
On August 29th, the team played against Walsall at home. This was the fifth round of the league. Griezmann continued his excellent form in this game. He first assisted Vardy to score, and then scored himself after dribbling in the penalty area!
Luton ultimately defeated Walsall two to zero. Griezmann was like a fish in water in the new position arranged for him by Gao Bo. He is becoming more and more adapted to the core position.
Three days after this round of the league, on September 1st, the team will immediately go to play an EFL Trophy game away. Gao Bo now has no energy to complain about the FA's schedule.
The rhythm of one game every three days made Gao Bo have the urge to use the blue redemption coupon on the team's physical fitness, but in the end, he still resisted, after all, good steel should be used on the blade. The EFL Trophy is completely a dispensable existence for Luton now, and the opponent in this game is Colchester, who also comes from League One, so Gao Bo does not intend to invest too many resources in the EFL Trophy.
The young players in the echelon got the opportunity to play and exercise, but facing Colchester, who sent out their main players, they still lost zero to one away.
Eliminated from the League Cup, followed by elimination from the EFL Trophy. Recently, bad news for Luton has been coming one after another.
But Gao Bo doesn't think this is bad news. It's nothing to be eliminated from two dispensable cup games. Gao Bo has even been in a very good mood recently—because Sandro received his Portuguese passport.
Mendes is indeed very powerful in Portugal. Before the Premier League transfer window closed, he finally got Sandro's Portuguese passport done.
In this way, Sandro can finally complete his registration in the league.
And what's coming up next is a league game, the first round of the league replay, Luton faces Tranmere away!
The final result of this game was one to one. Luton's one-to-zero lead was maintained until the 90th minute. As a result, in stoppage time, Tranmere equalized through a corner kick.
Luton suffered a last-minute equalizer!
This made Gao Bo, who was already preparing to withdraw his troops, extremely angry on the sidelines. In the locker room after the game, Gao Bo was very dissatisfied with the team's slackness at the last moment. The players endured the hairdryer treatment in the locker room for a full twenty minutes.
Afterwards, Gao Bo announced that training would continue the next day, and the holiday was cancelled!
After this round of the league, Luton has played a total of five league games. Although they have not lost, the three draws and two wins give them nine points, which only allows them to rank seventh in the league.
Compared with the crushing sweep in League Two last season, Luton, who have been promoted to League One, do seem to have lost the madness of last season.
"Compared to last season's crazy state, this season's Luton seems to have returned to normal," Lineker said on a BBC program.
"The level of League One and League Two is different. Perhaps Luton needs to change their mentality. League One is not so easy to play. These three draws are proof," said a guest.
"They also have to play in the Europa League. Luton has a lot of game tasks this season. Gao Bo may need to make a decision earlier. Luton is only a small club after all. They can only choose one front. They don't have the strength to fight on multiple fronts," another guest added.
Not only television programs, but many media outlets have also expressed pessimism about Luton's prospects.
Many teams have had such precedents. Fighting on multiple fronts ultimately dragged down the team, and in the end, they ended up empty-handed, getting nothing.
Will Luton follow in the footsteps of these teams?
Judging from Luton's fluctuating state from the start of the league until now, the media has reason to believe this.