Luton put in ‘real professional performance’ to go six points clear at top

Posted Sunday, February 03, 2019 by PA

Interim manager Mick Harford hailed a professional performance from Luton as the Hatters moved six points clear at the top of Sky Bet League One with a 3-0 win at Shrewsbury.

Top scorer James Collins, who had two spells with Shrewsbury earlier in his career, scored twice either side of a Matty Pearson strike as Luton extended their unbeaten run to 18 games.

Harford said: “Well, the scoreline says it’s a convincing win. Obviously, we are absolutely thrilled to keep the clean sheet. I thought it was a real, real professional performance on the back of a really hard January.

“We didn’t play at our best. They made it very difficult for us. They matched our shape. As you saw, the pitch wasn’t in the best condition, but overall I thought it was a real, real professional performance from the players.

“They were excellent today in terms of second balls, winning their headers, and I think when the game settled down and Matty scored that second goal I thought we were in total control and thoroughly deserved to win the game.”

Shrewsbury started brightly, with Greg Docherty firing over after seeing an earlier effort saved, before Luton took the lead on the half-hour.

Luke Berry headed Alan McCormack’s cross to Collins and the in-form striker finished confidently.

The visitors doubled their advantage eight minutes into the second half when Pearson’s cross from the right found its way in.

Collins then struck again in the 69th minute, his 18th goal of the season, after Shrewsbury were unable to clear Kazenga LuaLua’s cross.

Harford added: “They put us under pressure, they matched us up, they went man for man and we were pretty poor first half in all fairness in terms of possession and switching the play out to our full-backs and we went in 1-0 up and we were absolutely thrilled with that.”

Defeat saw Shrewsbury, who have an FA Cup fourth-round replay at Wolves on Tuesday, slip to second-bottom in the table.

Shrewsbury boss Sam Ricketts said: “I don’t want to sound like a broken record but first half there’s nothing really in the game. We still weren’t at the level I want to be but there was nothing in the game – but we can’t give goals away like we did.

“Then I think once the second goal goes in, which is like a comical goal as such, I think we just lose all aspect of belief and togetherness really which was disappointing and we spoke in the dressing room after the game.

“We spoke about it, spoke about why, spoke about what impact that has then on the team and we spoke about also how we’re going to come out of that.

“Nothing’s just going to happen by itself, so as a group we have to stick together. The players have to stick together, but they must put in sheer effort, aggression, intensity into the games, otherwise games pass you by.”