The three relegated sides from the Championship, Cardiff City, Luton Town and Plymouth Argyle all hope to bounce straight back up but all find themselves in different positions.
Cardiff City have dropped down to League One for the first time since it’s rebrand in 2004. This is new territory from the Bluebirds but clubs of Cardiff’s side tend to do quite well when it comes to bouncing back to the Championship.
Luton Town find themselves back in League one following back-to-back relegations after one season from the big time. As many clubs have done before, Luton peaked too soon.
Now on to Plymouth Argyle, a club who were arguably the best team League One had ever seen when they were crowned champions in the 2022/23 season. They understand the league and what it takes to get out of it.
Here’s how we think they could all get on next season in an unpredictable League One.
Plymouth Arygle
At the end of the 2023/24 season, Plymouth Argyle were in search of a new manager, having survived in the Championship on the final day of the campaign. The manager they landed on was Wayne Rooney.
This was a curious appointment by the club considering, that very season, the England legend had taken a Birmingham City side in sixth place and got them relegated. This would turn out to be a terrible appointment as Rooney left the club in December with the Greens bottom of the table. Despite a vast improvement under new manager Miron Muslic, Plymouth now find themselves in League One once again.
They also find themselves without Muslic who controversially left Devon for Schalke in the 2. Bundesliga following the conclusion of the season. They have replaced him with Tom Cleverley who, despite performing well in his first managerial role last season, became the latest in Watford’s revolving door of managers. Although inexperienced as a manager, this is a shrewd pickup by the Pilgrims.
Plymouth Argyle – Transfers
Before the season has even begun, Plymouth have seen two of their best players depart the club. Adam Randell has left for Bristol City and perhaps an even bigger loss, striker Ryan Hardie has left the club for newly promoted Wrexham.
Hardie has been a consistent goal scorer for Plymouth for several seasons now, scoring ten league goals last time out, as well as the only goal in the FA Cup game which saw Plymouth defeat Liverpool, who would go on to win the Premier League.
Plymouth Argyle – Bim Pepple
To try and replace Hardie, Argyle have bought in striker Bim Pepple from fellow relegated side Luton Town. Pepple saw an impressive rise last season starting out at Southend United in the National League where he scored 11 goals and provided two assists in 23 games before being recalled by Luton. He spent the latter half of the season out on loan in League Two with Chesterfield, where he scored five goals and got one assist in 23 appearances.
While certainly still a rawness to him, the Canadian is very quick, very strong and a real handful for defenders. He is still only 22 so will only improve, no doubt and even at his young age he knows where the net is. Certainly, one to watch out for to see if he can make yet another step up.
Plymouth Argyle – Brendan Wiredu
Argyle have also announced the signing of Fleetwood Town captain Brendan Wiredu. The versatile midfielder made thirty-seven appearances in all competitions last season, helping the Cod Army achieve a 14th place finish in League Two. Given Wiredu’s ability to play at centre half, full back as well as in midfield, combined with his experience in this league, this is an astute signing by Argyle.
However, it looks like Ukrainian centre back Maksym Talovierov could be on his way to Stoke City. The 25-year-old only signed for Plymouth in January last season, making thirteen appearances so far.
Plymouth fans should be optimistic going into the upcoming season. They’ve conducted some impressive transfer business and have an exciting manager at the helm. In addition, the last time Plymouth found themselves in League One, they finished on 101 points, winning the league over an Ipswich Town team who would go on to be promoted from the Championship the very next season.
Luton Town
It’s fair to say that at the start of the last Championship season, Luton Town fans were expecting their team to be playing in a different league come next year. However, I don’t think they were expecting that league to be League One. Despite only really losing Ross Barkley from the team that had put up a good fight in the Premier League, they couldn’t survive in the Championship and find themselves in the third tier once again.
Luton Town – Matt Bloomfield
If you wanted to get out of League One, I don’t think you could find a much better manager for the job, right now, then Matt Bloomfield. Bloomfield joined the Hatters in January last season but was unable to keep them up. In order to join Luton, he departed Wycombe Wanderers, whom he had competing with Birmingham City, who would go on to break the all-time EFL points record. Whilst Birmingham would finish the season on 112 points, Wycombe would finish in fifth place, 27 points behind, losing the playoff semi final to eventual winners Charlton Athletic.
Luton Town – Transfers
Luton’s transfer business so far has mainly consisted ofoutgoings. Striker Carlton Morris and goalkeeper Thomas Kaminski have both secured moves to ensure that they are playing Championship football next season.
The Hatters have also lost a fair amount of squad depth. Daiki Hashioka has joined Slavia Prague. Amari’I Bell has joined Charlton Athletic following the expiration of his contract. Veterans Tim Krul and Victor Moses have also left the club, as has Pelly Ruddock Mpanzu who, in 2023, became the first player to go from non-league to the Premier League with the same team. Worryingly for Luton fans, there is also interest in Alfie Doughty and Thelo Aasgaard.
The interest in Doughty comes from Middlesborough, where the manager who got Luton to the Premier League, Rob Edwards, is now in charge. In terms of incomings, midfielder George Saville has come in from Millwall and central defender Kai Naismith has come in permanently following a loan.
Even though Luton find themselves in a similar position to the one that they did last year (recently relegated and with many people expecting them to win the league) this time it feels different. With a new manager, who certainly knows what he is doing in this league and the money to build the team in his image, I think Luton Town will do very well this season.
Cardiff City
Rather surprisingly, Cardiff City find themselves gearing up for a season in the third tier of English football for the first time since 2003. Since being relegated from the Premier League in 2019, it has been a mixed bag for the Welsh outfit. 5th and 8th place finishes were followed by finishes of 18th, 21st and 12th before last season where they would finish rock bottom of the Championship causing the club to be relegated.
Eron Bulut had been manager since June 2023, but after only six league games of last season, he was sacked, his side only managing one point and one goal in that time.
Following the clubs worst start to a season in 94 years, Omer Riza, a former staff member of Bulut’s, became interim manager. He adopted a more attacking style of play and picked up 16 points in 12 games. Following a five-game winless streak, he was made Cardiff’s 12th permanent manager in the 14 years of Vincent Tan’s ownership. It wouldn’t take long to see that this was not the correct decision and with only three games of the season to go, midfielder Aaron Ramsey was tasked with saving the club from relegation.
Unsurprisingly he wasn’t able to do this. Who the next manager was going to be was very much up in the air. Former Rochdale and Manchester City U23 manager Brian Barry Murphy was chosen, with Ramsey making a shock move to Mexico, signing for Pumas.
Cardiff City – Departures
Now that Aaron Ramsey has left the club, it will be interesting to see what the Bluebirds do with some of their other high earners. Players such as Callum Chambers and Chris Willock have been heavily criticised for not justifying their wages. Club captain Joe Ralls and former Aston Villa player Anwar El Ghazi have already left the club, with Roko Simic completing a loan more to Bundesliga 2 side Karlsruher.
Republic of Ireland international Callum O’ Dowda has joined Robbie Keane’s Ferencvaros in Hungary. Striker Yakou Meite, who scored three goals in 34 games last season and centre back Dimitrious Goutas who made 36 appearances have also left the club. To be honest, aside from O’Dowda, I’m not sure that any of the players that Cardiff have let go of so far are major losses. They weren’t good enough last season and the majority of them are the wrong side of 30.
I think that, of the three relegated sides, Cardiff have the most work to do. They have the weakest squad on paper and a manager who is inexperienced at this level. They need to make signings, with Barry Murphy likely to use his Manchester City connections to his advantage to do so.
With teams such as Huddersfield looking primed to finish towards the top of the table, I wouldn’t be surprised if Cardiff don’t even make the playoffs this season. Although with a potential Gareth Bale takeover swirling, things could be blown wide open.
