Rob Edwards says he doesn’t concern himself with proving doubters wrong even though his Luton Town team are starting to change opinions that had them pegged as the Premier League’s whipping boys before a ball had even been kicked.
After 13 games, it’s his Hatters that are the only team out of the three promoted from the Championship that sit outside the relegation zone, having picked up a first long-awaited home win in the division, beating Crystal Palace 2-1 last week.
Almost as soon as they’d won promotion to the Premier League, Town had been the bookies favourites for the drop, with some pundits even predicting that they’d finished with a worse points tally than Derby County’s league lowest haul of 11 in 2007/08.
A victory at Brentford today would draw Luton level with the Rams’ record, but asked if the Hatters are proving naysayers wrong, Edwards said: “I don’t care. Sorry to be frank, but I don’t. All I really care about is us improving and trying to pick up points. People will have their opinions and in this day and age, there’s opinions from everywhere. We’ve got to be able to deal with that.
“I understand why the doubt was and is there. We can only answer that by performing well and picking up enough points.
“We’ve picked up a few points recently but if you look at the games we’ve got coming up now, all we can do is focus on trying to perform well and hopefully that will translate to points. But what that does outside doesn’t really concern me.”
Edwards also rebuffed any suggestion that there would be more of a focus on getting a result at Brentford with league leaders Arsenal and champions Manchester City up next for the Hatters.
“We’ve put all our energy and focus on this game,” said Edwards. “We’re aware of what’s coming next but we can’t think about that. It doesn’t matter who we had after Brentford, the game is really important because it’s our next chance to try and get something.”
And though avoiding the drop is the goal for Luton this term, Edwards has been looking at the Bees as one team to aspire to as they’ve established themselves in the division since getting promoted to the Premier League for the first time in 2021.
“We’ll do things our own way, but it’s a really good model for us to aspire to,” Edwards said of the Londoners’ rise.
“If we are able to have the sort of success they’ve had in recent years, by getting up, staying up and really progressing and flourishing, then that will be amazing for us. But, again, we’ll do things our way.
“But I’ve got nothing but admiration for Thomas Frank, his staff, his football club and what they’ve done. It really is impressive.”
Edwards added of his opposite number: “He’s done an amazing job. For me, he’s one of the best managers in the league. In the four or five years that he’s been there (it’s been) incredible progression year upon year. I think he’s excellent.
“His team are really well organised, very well coached and clear in what they’re do, whether they’re playing a team top or, no disrespect to us, a lesser team, they’re clear in what they do.
“Within all that, they’ve got some very good individuals as well. They’ve been able to improve year upon year.”
