Luton boss Rob Edwards admits it feels like a ‘lifetime’ ago that he took his first game in charge of the Hatters at Middlesbrough almost two years ago.
The Town chief had been appointed as Nathan Jones’ replacement in mid-November 2022, but then had to wait almost a month before actually taking charge of a game due to a winter break for the World Cup. Once he did on December 10, Luton took the lead at the Riverside Stadium through Jordan Clark’s fine finish, but were quickly pegged back by Chuba Akpom’s strike.
Once Amari’i Bell was then sent off for his second yellow card in the second half, Matt Crooks bagged a stoppage time winner to condemn Edwards to an opening defeat. Having quickly recovered from that loss to mastermind the Hatters to the Premier League via the play-offs, now back in the Championship once more, the Town chief makes his first return to the venue where it all started, as he said: “Lots has happened in that time. We went down to 10 men and lost late on didn’t we, but it was a decent performance. It feels like a lifetime, it’s a good place to go and play football.”
Although he has been in charge for a shade under two years, then the firing of Coventry City chef Mark Robins in the week means Edwards is now the fourth longest serving manager in the Championship behind Paul Warne (Derby), Michael Carrick (Middlesbrough) and Carlos Corberan (West Bromwich Albion). On his impressive longevity, especially when hiring and firing is so prevalent, Edwards continued: “In this day and age I suppose it is, it just shows the fragility of the job and we all go through it.
“I don’t know the full story (about Robins’ sacking), but I said it before we played them, I thought he was the best manager at this level. What he’s done at that football club is nothing short of incredible and it just shows that it can happen and it can happen to anyone. To be one of the longest serving now and it’s only around two years shows that it is a challenging job. We’re all very lucky to do it, but it can be very short-lived as well.”
While it was Edwards’ first game in charge, opposite number Carrick was also in the infancy of his spell in the north east, as he has led Boro to second tier finishes of fourth and eighth. This season they are currently eighth in the table, recovering from a 3-0 home defeat to Coventry in their last home match, to run riot at QPR on Tuesday night, triumphing 4-1.
On the challenge ahead, Edwards said: “The Championship is difficult isn’t it, there’s always inconsistencies in results. You might lose games where you don’t deserve to, there’s fine margins, but they’re consistent in how they perform. They’re a good team, well coached, good individuals as they were a couple of years ago when we were in this division, so a really difficult game, as I say every single time.
“We’ve got to make sure we’re right at it going up there and again try as best as possible to imprint our game there as well. They can be dominant, so we’ve got to try and not give them the game that they want. They’ve got good players, got a good way about them and they do create chances. If they get it right then they’re a big, big threat.
“We’re clear with how we want to try and go about it, aware of what they try and do. We’ve got to try and stop that but then make sure we can have a threat and be clear in how we want to win the games as well as that’s our aim, so a big challenge. A good team and good to watch as well, but like everyone, there’s always areas that we can try and exploit.”
With Boro having the highest xG (expected goals) of 1.64 in the Championship, Town seventh on 1.34, the play-off hopefuls have top scorer Tommy Conway on five goals, but it’s not just the ex-Bristol City forward who Luton have to watch out for. Edwards added: “He has (scored goals), if he plays. they’ve got (Emmanuel) Latte Lath who can play there as well, (Ben) Doak’s been doing well, they can play (Isaiah) Jones, there’s a number of players they can stick in there depending on how they want to go. They can freshen things up or look at different areas where they want to try and hurt us, so lots of good individuals.
“They get into your final third, they’ve got really good combinations, corner runs, cut-backs, numbers in the right areas, lots of stuff going on. Good one v one specialists as well, so we’re going to need to defend properly with good numbers and make sure we’re very diligent with that. Wednesday was another step forward for us where we were able to be aggressive with our pressing, but we were still solid behind that and on the opposite side of the pitch as well. So a couple of positives over the last few games and it will be a real test tomorrow to see if we can continue that.”
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