LUTON. – Luton Town boss Rob Edwards felt his side shot themselves in the foot as Marvelous Nakamba and his teammates opened their Premiership campaign with a 1-4 defeat at Brighton & Hove Albion on Saturday.
It was Nakamba’s first Premiership game in 16 months.
The Hatters looked like they were down and out with 71 minutes gone, Tom Lockyer giving away a penalty for a dubious foul on the hosts’ £30m signing Joao Pedro, who got up to beat Thomas Kaminski from the spot.
Town then gave themselves a lifeline when Jacob Brown’s cross was handled by Lewis Dunk, Carlton Morris netting his and the club’s first-ever Premier League goal to make it 2-1 with 10 minutes left. However, the Hatters then made a number of mistakes ahead of the Seagulls’ clinching third, Lockyer’s pass cut out, before Pelly-Ruddock Mpanzu’s touch let him down allowing Simon Adingra to lash home.
Evan Ferguson then went on to add a fourth in stoppage time, as asked if the resulting scoreline was harsh, Edwards said: “Yes and no if I’m being honest.
“I thought we were right in the game at 1-0 and 2-1, but we shot ourselves in the foot.
“We made a couple of clear errors in the build-up to the third goal and we got punished, and at this level you do get punished.
“It shows the ruthless nature of the league, as just before at 2-0 down, we made some aggressive changes, we got back into the game.
“Whether it was a penalty or not, at 2-1, I’m really disappointed with the manner we conceded the third goal.
“You’re caught in a balance against a team like this when you want to be aggressive and try to get back into the game, but you know you’re going to leave yourself open and there was space.
“A team like that smells blood and then towards the end they start opening you up a little bit and they started opening us up a little bit.
“But I want to say that there’s some positives there. There were some really good moments in the first half.
“We carried out a gameplan very well, we were compact, resilient and retained a real threat on the counter attack.
“We had some good moments from set-pieces that I would like us to be more clinical in, so overall, yes some good stuff, but we’ve got to learn and we’ve got to learn quickly in certain areas.” – Luton Today