Luton boss Matt Bloomfield said there would be “no finger pointing” as his side were the architects of their own downfall, handing ten-man Plymouth their first League One victory away from Home Park this season with a gaffe-filled goal giveaway.
Town came into the game with the stingiest defence in the division and with a chance of setting a club record for the best defensive start to a Football League campaign, but any hope of that imploded spectacularly as they slumped to back-to-back home league defeats. It’s will not be a 120th birthday that Kenilworth Road will want to remember.
Luton were never in front, but for the last two Argyle goals Bradley Ibrahim won’t get better gifts this side of Christmas. The winner – a Jordan Clark clearance that ricocheted off him and in – he knew nothing about, but that came in the 75th minute so the hosts had plenty of time to try and rescue something. They could not. Not even with ten added minutes.
Instead, the Pilgrims, as they had done in their Championship visit to Kenilworth Road last term, headed, blocked and repelled everything thrown at them, with their 41 headed clearances telling a good deal of the story of Town’s failed efforts.
“We win and lose together. There’s no point finger pointing. We’ll analyse it, get back to work Monday and make sure we’re harder to beat because that’s the bedrock of any successful team,” said Bloomfield.
“We’ve barely given a goal away from a mistake for a while and then three in the same game – very disappointing, very frustrating. If you give three goals away like that you’re not going to win too often.”
“We had another 23 shots today, added to our 22 against Cardiff. That’s 45 shots in the last two home games. We’re getting in the box plenty, we just need to be more clinical and score more goals.”
“All three goals were our mistakes and we have to eradicate them. The individual mistakes will be punished – whatever level you play at – and that’s where we lost the game, in both penalty areas.”
“I thought we had good momentum against 11 and not quite as much against 10, which is disappointing. We could have moved the ball quicker.”
“We have to go back to being a really solid defensive team because the more we let opponents get in front, the harder we make life for ourselves.”
Matthew Sorinola opened the scoring on 15 minutes and extinguished those chances of a club record, as his back post run and header was not picked up. But Town were only behind for five minutes when Lasse Nordås was elbowed by Brendan Wiredu to hand Jerry Yates the chance to open his league account from the spot, which he took.
Then on the stroke of half time came error number one. Zack Nelson had his pocket picked by Bradley Ibrahim on the edge of his own penalty area and the Pilgrim pile-drove a shot past Josh Keeley.
But the game swung again early in the second half when Gideon Kodua was manhandled for a second Hatters penalty, which half time substitute Nahki Wells converted to open his account for the club.
And, moments later, things got even better for Luton when Joe Edwards scythed down Alli and got his marching orders from referee Ollie Yates, who then denied Town another two penalties, that Bloomfield believed were nailed on. He even booked Alli for simulation in one.
“In my opinion it’s a penalty, so to do him for simulation, it’s probably the situation because of two already given, a lot of that’s probably human emotion that’s played into the decision from the referee,” said the manager.
“Zack’s one, he’s got across the defender, actually stalled, so Zack gets in front of him and he comes and barges him over and nothing’s given.”
He added: “I think it’s probably naive of me to sit here and complain about not getting penalties when we got two, but I think the two clearer ones were the ones we didn’t get.”
But then came the Keystone Cops moment when a harmless shot from the halfway line saw Keeley try and fail to control, conceding a corner. Before it could be taken, Plymouth boss Tom Cleverley was sent from the dugout, having been booked in the first half.
Kenilworth Road gave him pelters as he walked around the perimeter of the pitch and down the tunnel, but the former Watford boss would have the last laugh.
From the corner, Luton failed to clear. Keeley made an instinctive save and then Jordan Clark’s clearance hit Ibrahim and went in.
They huffed and they puffed in trying to find a response, but more often than not they booted big crosses to where Argyle’s giant defenders gobbled them up.
Even with ten added minutes due to Plymouth time-wasting and injuries were not enough for Luton to find an equaliser and the boos at the final whistle were the only predictable outcome of a bonkers game of football, one that Town will wonder how they were ever even in a position to fluff their lines so spectacularly.
1 Trackback / Pingback
Comments are closed.