That's a brilliant sign - standing up to a physical onslaught and coming out on top. They will take so much from last night and continue to grow. Next challenge is not getting complacent or chucking in a poor home display after 2 great away wins. Great team to support at the minute in so many ways.
had a sleep and another think about this game, then watched the extended highlights. that really was third division luton, pushing, pulling and falling over every chance and the fans are as daft as the players...the amount of soft free kicks the ref gave them while he completely ignored the same fouls on us was glaringly obvious, luckily i had our own commentary on for the game but heard the sky commentary on the replay, pleased i never had to sit through that bias. i also stick by what i said after the game, we were rubbish (by our standards) and never really got going but on that i have to give luton credit, they basically bombarded our back line (think someone posted a stat from last nights games where our game had 60+ headed duels around twice as many as the other games, tells a lot) but then i have to also give credit to our lads for digging in and taking care of it. i maybe did our central lads a disservice as they were called on to defend rather than the usual job of playing the ball about, if onien gets any kind of 'come-uppance' for his leap then thier keeper should get some as well, the way he grabbed onto mephams (i think it was) shirt at the end was like someone starting a street fight and has no place on a football field, plus onien and the luton lad came out with smiles and shook hands.
It was probably the only time in the game players switched off. Neil let Morris run free, Cirkin didnt react to the flight of the first ball and Jobe didnt mark his man. One of them doesnt make the mistake and the goal probably doesnt happen. Still, I thought the reaction of the side to that setback told us all we need to know about the mentality of these players. Pleasure to have them represent us.
Sorry if posted but Rob Edwards said this about us last night. Refreshing to see a manager praise us, especially considering it seems fans and managers of every club we play tell us we're **** and won't go up etc. “They went very close, you went very close a couple of years ago, and I don't see any reason why you won't be there or thereabouts now with how you've started and what you're doing. I think we put you under a lot of pressure tonight and stood up to it, and credit for winning the game.”
Regis is way too modest. He said a couple of tweaks were made. In reality he transformed the game in our favour at half time. In the first half the gaps between our forwards and midfield and midfield to the back line were too big. It meant Luton could win loose balls and come right back at us. Second we compressed our half my pushing the defensive line higher and bring the likes of Browne and Jobe back 5 yards. It meant when we won the first header we had a fighting chance of securing the loose ball. We then had less pressure and more space in front of us to play into. The players responded well to those tactics too. Browne, for example, was really poor first half. Second half he really grew into the game with the pitch made smaller for him. Jobe the same to a lesser extent. They had much more chance to impact Luton players because everyone was closer to each other. Jobes physical dominance of 2 of their midfielders second half was unreal. He does it so naturally too, it is a massive strength he has. Overall it was Regis who won us the game last night. Rigg and Mundle get the glory. Anyone of 4 could have been MoM. But Regis is the tactician who unpicked the lock on this game and turned what might have been a loss to 3 massive points. He seems a really special coach to me.
Just a thought on this. There were several people demanding subs at half time, and I've seen a lot of this already this season, even though we've been doing well. Imagine what it will be like when we go on a bad run. But anyway, my point is I think our fanbase need to get used to it being a LOT more nuanced than this. Its the first time we've had a Head Coach who seems to know what he's doing. He's making major changes to how we play without changing the formation or the personnel. We don't need to make subs to change things up. He's changing the style of play, the press, the out of possession positioning, all small tweaks that make major difference. Us fans are used to needing to see subs to see changes. Not with Reggie. I actually think its WHY he doesnt make as many subs. Because he finds it easier and more effective to tweak whats already there, rather than change the personnel.
It's good to see a coach that reacts to what he sees on the pitch and acts accordingly rather than not admit he may have made a mistake in the set up and keep playing the same way. Have to admit, I think we've got a seriously good coach in RLB, he's someone who thinks long and hard about tactics and how the game is played.
Just watched the game back and been looking at the data of the game and came to some conclusions. If you exclude set pieces the game was very even with SAFC probably creating the better chances. 11 of their 19 shots came from set piece situations, 2 of ours did and they were from same corner which was a bit botched and Cirkin ended up having 2 shots. We were always going to give up opportunities from set pieces against Luton, everyone does. But from open play we restricted them to very few opportunities, only really the header from Adebayo that Patterson tipped over that was a major chance. Looking at the xG numbers of individual shots, we had a few high xG chances whereas they had a lot of low xG shots which inflates their total number. Our open play work, both from an attacking and defensive standpoint, was very good. We won't play a game like that again for the rest of the season. A well deserved and well fought 3 points.
Yes but he's 'proud to have his Luton back' I made the mistake of replying to a Luton fan when I was looking through the Youtube clips. He reckons Sunderland are rubbish, the ref gave us everything and we won't go up. He claimed both of our goals were down to individual errors. When I said none of their players, in 97 minutes, tried to do anything close to what Rigg and Mundle did he vanished and hasn't responded ... ... seriously, if this is what they enjoy watching I'm sorry for them.
Certainly looks that way although why Neil would be covering one of the main strikers could be debated separately
Lost count the number of times Morris won headers last night at the back post, think we gambled not taking a big lad out the centre to counteract him. Patto made a good tip over from one, and Morris sneaked in for the offside goal again with no one picking him up. Yes we won but perhaps we will learn a lot from last night's game.
