Luton signed off their pre-season campaign with a 3-1 home defeat to Premier League Brighton & Hove Albion as boss Nathan Jones admitted his Hatters defence have been “decimated” and his preparations “disjointed” with key members unable to be selected due to pandemic protocols.
Town were without centre halves Sonny Bradley, Tom Lockyer and Reece Burke, while midfielder Henri Lansbury was also missing, with the suggestion that Covid, or the knock-on effects have largely been a factor.
“There’s been so much disruption this pre-season. We’ve been a little makeshift in what we’ve had to do, especially defensive centre half partnerships,” said Jones.
“At the minute it’s been so disjointed in terms of the last two-and-a-half weeks that we’ve just got to make sure that we get to Monday, re-evaluate, see who we’ve got and move from there.
“It’s a bit of everything but the majority of it is what we don’t talk about. It’s effecting everyone. It affects us. We stick to protocols and so on but it’s been so disjointed.
“We’ve got three centre halves out. We had to play Gabby (Gabriel Osho) in there, Peter Kioso, Glen Rea, because we’ve been decimated in that area.
“Pretty much the ones I brought on, have hardly trained, so it’s been really disjointed. But let’s be positive, it’s been a good run-out, it’s a real good test.
“We’ll look at it and see what we need to do. At times, we looked a real good side. As soon as we stepped up the tempo, we had chance, chance and then they had a sucker punch and that’s why we need to do the basics better.”
Asked if the so-called Covid ‘Pingdemic’ has had an effect – which means people have to isolate for ten days if they come into contact with anyone with the disease – Jones said: “Not quite. It’s just the way it is at the minute. We’ve just had disruption so much and that’s the thing. A lot of players have suffered, one way or another and that means a knock-on effect with everyone.
“Dan Potts has to play more minutes that we would’ve liked him to. Then he picked up an injury because of that, so it’s a knock-on effect constantly with certain things, so we have to be clever and do the right things. That’s the way of the world.”
The manager suggested the issues are not necessarily going to affect his starting line-up for next week’s Championship curtain-raiser against Peterborough, but the lack of training and game time has been a concern.
Jones said: “It just means that one or two that you’d like to have far more work, don’t get it.
“If it happened now, then we’d be in trouble. But we’ve had a few things that have disrupted us, which means that certain people haven’t been able to train.
“If they haven’t been able to train, are they ready? I’m not saying it’s decimated the thing, because we’ve still got real good numbers, but in certain areas, certain people have had it and that’s what’s hurt us a bit.”
With their makeshift defence against Brighton, Town were 2-0 down inside 35 minutes through former Luton loanee Aaron Connolly and Enock Mwepu. The first of those came through Albion’s very first attack as the hosts, without three of their centre backs, got unpicked by Adam Lallana.
But just before half time, Harry Cornick pounced when Dan Burn shanked a pass into his path and he only had out-rushing keeper Robert Sanchez to beat.
Town were brighter in the second half, spearheaded by their only mid-point substitute, Jordan Clark, who was by far and away their most effective player.
The winger assumed the captain’s armband after Kal Naismith was withdrawn but it was a string of incisive passes and crosses that caught the eye. One in particular deserved a better finish than Carlos Mendes-Gomes could muster with his head, but it marked out Clark as a man that surely must start against newly promoted Peterborough United.
