Assistant boss looks forward to promotion clash
Town head to promotion rivals Forest Green full of confidence having made it five wins out of their last six games in last Saturday’s 2-0 FA Cup win at Cambridge.
The blip in between against Braintree apart, the Hatters have been in top form and, buoyed by their sixth win in eight matches away from Kenilworth Road last weekend, assistant boss Alan Neilson is hoping more of the same from the side at the New Lawn.
“The last two matches stand us in good stead as we’ve won both and kept two clean sheets,” Neilson said as he stepped in for the boss at Thursday’s press conference. “The Cambridge performance was a really good away display and it was typical of how we’ve been playing away from home.
“When we play away the onus is on the home team to attack and, as you saw at Cambridge, we were able to hit them on the counter attack and score to very good goals.”
Dave Hockaday’s side inflicted a 3-0 defeat on the Town the last time to the two sides met last March.
This time round the longest serving club in the Conference are enjoying a fine campaign so far, and Neilson is under no illusions how tough the trip to the Cotswolds will be for the Hatters.
“That night last season we didn’t turn up,” admitted Neilson. “But that was then and this is now – this is a different Luton Town.
“Myself and the manager went to watch their cup replay at Dartford on Tuesday night and we’re expecting a difficult game.
“We’ve had them watched a lot recently like we do with all of our opponents and we know that they’ll raise their game against us.
“They’ve invested in the summer and have several strikers and midfielders capable of scoring goals and it shows in the start they’ve made.
“It’ll a great game to play in, it’s third versus fifth and they’ll be a big crowd. We all know the importance of this game and games like these. We want to get three points against a team who we feel will be up there challenging at the end of the season.
“We don’t want them to over-take us. We want to pull ahead of them so it’s important we get three points.”