Luton beat Preston North End 4-0 to move back into the Championship play-off places courtesy of a three goals in the first half, in a really clinical performance at both ends of the pitch. Here are our takeaways from the evening.
- Top of the tree
Great teams are built on strong defensive foundations and in snuffing out Preston, Luton notched their 16th clean sheet of the Championship campaign. No other team in the division has managed as many.
That stat would be incredible on its own, but considering Town don’t currently have a fit recognised centre half, it’s astonishing.
Kal Naismith and Tom Lockyer were ruled out between Sunday’s 2-1 defeat to QPR and Wednesday’s visit of Preston, while Sonny Bradley has been missing since January. Then, when Reece Burke, who has been imperious of late, pulled up 23 minutes the midweek contest, it could’ve been the signal for a defensive capitulation.
Not this Luton side though. Dan Potts captained the side and, his best performances have come when he’s been played as a centre back. Even Jones sees that as the position he’s destined for, seeing as left back Amari’i Bell is turning out to be one of the signings of the season.
Right back Peter Kioso is another player, who has been further down the pecking order, with the manager’s well-known appreciation of James Bree. He too, put in a performance of such high quality – and was briefly credited with Fred Onyedinma’s goal – that many will disappointed if he’s not given a new deal come the end of the campaign.
Kioso said of his contract situation: “I’m not worried about the end of the season. I’ll deal with that when it happens. Right now, I’m worried about helping the boys about and when called upon, I’ll do what I need to do and the boys know I’ll always have their back and they’ll have mine.
“I’ll take it game by game. I’m not worried about the rest of the season, which is Hull, and we’ll see what we can do. We want more points on the tally and that’s the most important thing.”
But when called upon he’s largely done the business with 5 clean sheets in his 13 appearances in all competitions.
2. 100 Club
James Shea joined the 100 club against Preston, and marked the occasion with his 40th clean sheet, and 7th in 15 appearances this term, in all competitions. It’s some record, even though he’s had to wait until his fifth year to mark the milestone.
But he’s been a fantastic servant to Town, and was a deserving winner of the Golden Gloves award in the League One title season.
Against Preston, he made a fine stop to keep out Cameron Archer, even if the flag was up. But he was largely left to enjoy his century of appearances, by watching Town rip Preston to pieces at the other end of the pitch.
3. Bouncebackability
Town did not deserve to lose on Sunday to QPR. We’ve all seen what a howler referee Josh Smith had, including allowing to stand the Londoners’ offside winner.
The Rs didn’t have a sniff until Naismith dived in recklessly on former Hatter Andre Gray to give away a penalty.
After beating Preston, boss Nathan Jones said: “They (QPR) were very disrespectful to us, the way they celebrated, they won a game, but I think they got rattled as they’re QPR and they should be up the top of the league. But they came here below Luton Town and how dare Luton Town be above QPR?
“I think that was a bit about it. Fair play to them, they beat us, they beat us regularly, but we had to regroup. They’re (Luton) such a group, they want to bounce back, they want to achieve something, I love working with them and they deserve so much credit, they really do.”
As disappointing as that weekend result was, Luton have made a great trait of rarely suffering the same fate twice. Only once they’ve tasted consecutive Championship defeats, but more often than not – seven times in fact – they’ve got straight back to winning ways. Only twice have they had to settle for a draw.
Preston were no mugs either, having arrived at Kenilworth Road unbeaten in their previous six away days, while conceding only once. Luton simply made mincemeat of that record, to such a degree that Lilywhites’ boss Ryan Lowe said that the club would refund the 614 travelling North End fans.
4. Progression regardless of promotion
With nine games left, Luton are firmly in the mix for the play-offs and with a game in hand on Blackburn Rovers and Huddersfield, with the Terriers still to play, and now with a better goal difference than both of them.
It’s fully time to enjoy the ride and they’re looking good for a top six spot, but regardless of whether they finish in the end of season shake-up, the chief aim of progression is all but assured.
Luton now sit in fifth place on 60 points, which is two points less than the entirety of last term, and one less than they finished with in their previous best Championship campaign in the 2005/06 season.
They’ve already scored more (53 to 41) and conceded less (41 to 52) than the last campaign, including one more clean sheet (16 to 15), and only a fool would predict that they won’t secure their best second tier finish and tally since winning promotion to the top-flight in 1982, when they claimed 88 points.
5. Big bid for a start against Hull
We wait on injury news around Town’s four centre halves, but have seen that Peter Kioso and Dan Potts can do the job there, if called upon against Hull on Saturday.
But one player who threw his hat firmly in the ring for a start at the weekend was Fred Onyedinma.
The 25-year-old has had to bide his time since switching to Town in the summer. In his 22 appearances he’s only been on the pitch twice for the full 90 minutes.
He probably won’t have expected to have made his 14th substitute’s appearance so soon on Wednesday night, but Reece Burke’s injury midway through the first half gave him his chance and he grabbed it with both hands, even playing as right wing back for the first time this term, with James Bree moving into the centre of defence.
Onyedinma scored his third of the campaign and generally proved a handful for Preston and he was my man of the match, despite Amari’i Bell and Peter Kioso being strong contenders. But, as good as they were, particularly Kioso in an unfamiliar position on only his 13th Championship appearance, you’d be really hard pushed to give that award to two defenders in such a clinical and resounding 4-0 win full of relentless attacking verve.
And Onyedinma’s pace and trickery proved such as effective weapon, you’d struggle to think what more he has to do to earn a start against Hull on Saturday.
6. Championship quality
Luton still have never lost in the 17 games when he’s got on the scoresheet, but Luke Berry’s first half brace proved beyond any doubt that the “not-good-enough-for-the-Championship” brigade got it very wrong. He is. He claimed his sixth and seventh of the season in just 14 appearances, which is hardly the return of a lower league also-ran. There’s really no explanation of his quality needed other than watch this finish for his second against Preston.
It needs no explanation, but Jones did say: “It’s timing, momentum and then the ball, if he was already in there and static he wouldn’t have done it, but his timing, it’s Luke Berry and that’s what he does superbly well.
“With the greatest respect, he’s not the quickest player in history, but he’s one of the most intelligent and that’s why he’s a chameleon.
“That’s why he adapts to every level he has because of his cleverness and his adaptability and his ability as he’s a wonderful footballer.”
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