Luton have a loan decision to make on Dion Pereira, with manager Nathan Jones prepared to leave it late to assess whether the attacker will get enough minutes.
The Hatters boss has talked glowingly of the 23-year-old since signing him in December 2020, but he’s only played once in the Championship, against Queens Park Rangers at the end of the 2020/21 campaign.
Last term, Pereira was sent out to Bradford for the end of last season after an injury-hit spell at Yeovil, but the forward, who was with Atalanta in the MLS before joining Luton, impressed during pre-season. And was one of the standout performers despite Town’s shock 3-2 Carabao Cup exit at home to League Two Newport County on Tuesday.
Now, the question is whether he’s done enough to break through to the first-team squad regularly and Jones said: “He’s right on the periphery, he’s done really well in pre-season and really impacted and shown that he has real quality and we can use that, so it’s a late decision on him.
“A lot will depend on the interest we get in him as if we don’t get anything suitable then 100 per cent he will stay here, we’ve had a few (clubs) that would take him, it’s just whether that is right for him at this point.
“Yes, he always impresses in training, he always does stuff and he always affects the training session, it’s about whether he’s going to get enough minutes to keep him moving forward, that’s what the decision is.
“You can keep everyone around if they all get minutes and they all stay fit and potent then you’d be brilliant, but we have to understand that not everyone can play and invariably people will start to lose a little bit of that zest and that zip and that’s why they go out on loan.”
Jones also has decisions to make on Admiral Muskwe and Carlos Mendes Gomes, who scored a stunner against Newport on Tuesday before being forced off at the break with an injury.
“It’s just about game time for them, we like them, they’re good players, it’s just about getting game time,” said Jones.
The Luton manager has made no secret of needing to send some players on loan after a stellar summer of signings has swelled his squad.
He used Tuesday’s Carabao Cup clash to make wholesale changes to his Championship 11, to give minutes to peripheral players, but a second successive exit in the first round to fourth-tier opposition has not influenced the need to test out the loan market for some of his squad.
Jones said: “They would have done (gone on loan) regardless of the cup, there’s one or two that need the exposure, need the game time for their own development and their own sanity really, so we’ve always known that and we were going to play them in the Newport game as we had eight, maybe nine games in a month.
“We knew it was going to be tough, and we’ll need the squad, so when we have a number of players that are potentially available (on loan) just to keep their development moving forward.
“We want to make sure we get the right club for them and get the right people coming in for them, and once they do that, provided we can do a deal, they’ll get the game time they need.”
Luton have already sent newest signing Aribim Pepple on loan to Grimsby for the season, where he’ll join injured John McAtee after Town signed the goalscorer from the Mariners and loaned him back for the rest of the campaign.
Talking of the 19-year-old signing from Canadian Premier League out Calgary FC, Jones said of Pepple: “Yes, we want him to play, we send them out to clubs that want them for the right reasons and Grimsby did that, so we’ll be interested to see how he does.
“Pepple is 19 so he’s got a long time. He has played first-team games so bringing him back just to train and give him development football isn’t conducive. We found a good club for him in Grimsby, we know how they work and how they coach. He will have a good education there and we are really pleased.”
Pepple made his Football League debut on Tuesday as Grimsby beat Crewe 4-0 in the EFL Cup, but McAtee will be out for a number of months as he’ll need shoulder surgery.
Jones said of the injury, which the striker had at the end of last term and aggravated on the opening day of the season: “We knew that prior, so it’s whether we pull out of the deal or go OK, we won’t see him anyway until earliest Christmas, because we send him back out on loan.
“So it was about getting it right so he can perform the best he can and then hopefully come back and impact on us.”
