Nathan Jones hailed a “magnificent away performance” that set the tone for Town’s Championship campaign as a clean sheet and James Collins’ fourth in two games saw them past Barnsley to an opening day defeat.
Oakwell was the scene of the Hatters’ first league victory last term, but they had to wait until their fifth outing for that. It wasn’t quit the same rip-roaring start this time around, when the now-departed Jacob Butterfield netted in the opening minute, but it was an even sweeter strike than that.
The 71st minute was when it arrived and Collins, who bagged a Carabao Cup hat-trick last week, almost ripped the net off the posts as he crashed in a rare Pelly-Ruddock Mpanzu headed knockdown.
And other than Dominik Frieser missing a sitter soon after the goal, Luton kept Barnsley at bay, with keeper Simon Sluga a relative spectator.
“It’s a magnificent away performance,” said Jones, adding: “Bearing in mind we’ve stepped up a level now in the Championship. We’ve said we don’t want to be anywhere near where we were and that’s a good start.
“We’ve got to build a foundation and build the blocks so that we are not scratching, trying to climb and trying to go after teams. We want to be in the mix and in a better position, so that teams are not coming to us and thinking, ‘these are easy, these will concede.’
“We’ve conceded one in six games through pre-season and today and that’s the foundation that we have to make sure we have week in, week out.
“I’m really, really proud. We’ve got to be a little bit better, in terms of our fluency, but that will come.”
While it wasn’t a classic footballing exhibition, the Tykes struggled to cope with the visitors’ aggression and Jones said: “We were a little bit different from last season. We were more proactive and pressed a lot higher and that’s the thing we’ve worked on.
“We want to step on to teams, win the ball higher and be a little more proactive in the way we go about it, and they did. It’s such a great group.
“We played these eight weeks ago and they were better than us. They pressed us and we had to contain them and even though we drew the game, they were a little more front footed than us.
“It’s a total change today. We were front-footed, we pressed, we had energy, we were aggressive and I’m really proud of my team today. I thought they were excellent from start to finish.
“We thoroughly deserved the win. It’s a difficult place to come to because not many will win here, I’m telling you. They beat Forest last week and the way they play, the aggression and the freedom they play with, I’m so proud of my boys.
“It’s great to get off to a win. You don’t want to lose and think ‘where’s our first win coming from?’ We’ve put that to bed now so now we’re looking for the second.”
