Chris Wilder braced for ‘big month’ as Sheff Utd move level at the top

Chris Wilder said Sheffield United are ready for a “big month” after goals from Jesurun Rak-Sakyi gave his side an assured 2-0 victory over struggling Luton at Bramall Lane.

A goal in each half from the Crystal Palace loanee, who was also celebrating his 22nd birthday, gave the Blades a comfortable win over the Hatters who offered little on the day.

Sheffield United drew level on points with Sunderland at the Championship summit.

Wilder said: “It’s been a good win for us today, we played well. We kept doing the right things and wore them into submission and I’m delighted with the performance and the result.

“We worked really hard to get Jesurun (Rak-Sakyi) in this summer so I’d like to thank the board for letting me push on that one. He was at his very best today and we want to see more of that.

“The confidence that will give him and the belief, we understand that’s what forward players are there to do but we’re there as a team to win games of football. We’re on a nice little run at the moment.

“You go on that nonsense social media and bits and pieces and ‘nobody’s done this’ or ‘nobody’s done that’, ‘where are we going to get the goals from?’ and all stuff like that. The young boys are finding their way, we have new players finding their way in a new system.

“There’s a lot of big tests coming up, it’s going to be a big month for us.

“It’s sometimes difficult for players when they’re not playing but they can see that they are all a part of it. They want to listen, they want to learn and they want to get better.

“I don’t see how people can compare last season to this season, it’s a completely different team. Different way, different cultures, different personalities this season.”

Luton manager Rob Edwards said his side have been struggling with a lack of confidence and belief so far this season.

Edwards said: “You can lose here at the moment with the form that they’re in and the form that we’re in but there’s a way to do it.

“This is on me and I’ve got to fix it. We’ll work hard and try and support the players on the training pitch to make sure we can fix the areas we’re not doing so well in at the moment.

“We changed things as we wanted to give ourselves more solidity but the two goals we conceded which have ultimately cost us the game were really disappointing.

“In this job you’re damned if you do and you’re damned if you don’t. I got asked why I didn’t change things, we do change it, it doesn’t work, it’s difficult at the moment.

“It was really frustrating and today was the bluntest we’ve looked. When we did have numbers back we didn’t defend well enough. We’ve got to stick together and turn this around.

“We’ve been far too open today. We didn’t want to leave those spaces for Sheffield United so we still wanted to press but from a deeper position.

“With the international break there’s going to be a lot of work going on and hopefully we can start to try and feel better about the situation.

“We’ve had a difficult start to the season but we have to keep going. At the moment there’s a lack of confidence and belief but we’re going to do everything we can to fight through that.”