For a fixture between two clubs separated by just 20 miles, Saturday's League One clash at Stadium MK carries unusual significance. MK Dons will welcome Luton Town for the first time since November 2004, when the two sides met at the former National Hockey Stadium. The long gap stems largely from contrasting fortunes in promotion and relegation that have kept the clubs apart for two decades, meaning this weekend's 12:30 BST kick-off represents a genuine rarity on the fixture list.

While the two clubs are not traditional rivals in the conventional sense — nothing like the fierce animosity Luton fans reserve for Watford — there remains a current of resentment among sections of the Hatters support towards their Buckinghamshire opponents. That feeling traces back to one of English football's most contentious episodes: the relocation of Wimbledon FC to Milton Keynes in 2003, a move that effectively created MK Dons and which many regard as having trampled on the traditions of a community-based club.

For some Luton supporters, the issue is not personal dislike of the town or its people, but what the franchise model represents within the English game. "I don't dislike Milton Keynes, I dislike what they stand for," said Luton fan Mike Fanning. "They're a franchise and that's not what football is about. It's a working men's game, about a club and its community and it matters. It can't be taken away. You can't up sticks and go elsewhere because someone wants you to."

What makes the rivalry particularly poignant for Luton fans is the knowledge that their own club came perilously close to suffering the same fate decades earlier. In the 1980s, with Luton Town in serious financial difficulty, proposals emerged to relocate the club to Milton Keynes under the name 'MK Hatters'. The Football League gave initial approval to the idea in 1983, and then-chairman Denis Mortimer argued the move could help the club tap into a new fanbase.

The plan only collapsed after fierce resistance from supporters, who organised marches, protests and a petition that gathered thousands of signatures. Longtime fan John Pyper recalled his involvement in that campaign. "I was on the action committee to fight the move to MK back in the 1980s," he said. "We could have lost our club, but we fought the decision of our then directors to take the offer to move to MK. We boycotted games back then."

Pyper added that watching another club eventually make that very move to Milton Keynes two decades later stirred complicated emotions. "I was so upset when they took a club to Milton Keynes in the end," he said. "Why didn't they set up their own club using their own different towns and villages within their own vicinity?"

Fanning, who was still at school during the original protests, believes the club's survival owes everything to that generation of fans who refused to accept the move. "We could have been the MK Hatters," he said. "We are still in existence because of those loyal people who protested and marched. Many of those fans are still going to games now, so it's raw."

With that history hanging over the occasion, Fanning expects Saturday's reunion to stir deep feelings among the travelling support. "Saturday will be an emotional moment," he said.

Beyond the three points on offer in League One, the fixture at Stadium MK offers a reminder of a period when English football grappled publicly with questions of ownership, identity and community — issues that still resonate whenever these two clubs' paths finally cross.

Based on reporting from BBC Sport.