Hard work will help says the boss ahead of Rovers
The embryonic League 2 table doesn’t make for much exciting reading for the Town followers who will flick through tonight’s programme and eye the current standings – but with 44 games left to play there’s plenty of time for that to change.
John Still, the Hatters boss, who himself doesn’t pay attention to the league ladder for at least another six matches, is happy enough.
Content with the start his side have made to this fledging campaign, the manager believes there’s plenty more to come from a team which showed flashes of what could lie ahead this season in Saturday’s 2-2 draw with Oxford United.
“The more we play to the same level of the last three games, and the more we keep those levels the better we’ll get,” Still said at his Monday afternoon press conference.
“We’ll get fitter, but sharper, too. The sharpness was there on Saturday more than it was in the previous two matches.”
The Hatters let a two-goal lead slip in the final seven minutes against the U’s. Today’s league table could have looked oh-so different – not that it makes much difference in mid-August.
But while disappointed to surrender all three points so late in the day against Oxford, Still remains positive.
“Saturday’s game could have been all over, the way we moved the ball around in the first 20 minutes,” said Still.
“We had a goal ruled out for offside, Paul Benson’s hit the post; we had our chances. It could have been 3-0 at half-time but it wasn’t.
“We got it to 2-0 but there was nothing we could do about their first goal and even then we kept going. We probably didn’t push out enough in the closing stages but you can understand that kind of nervous mentality. Oxford pumped the ball in the box, Mark Tyler’s made a mistake…but we’ll live with that.”
The beauty of league fixtures in August is that the Town have a game so quickly to put things right when Bristol Rovers – where Still once spent time on the coaching staff – arrive at Kenilworth Road tonight.
“Bristol are like us, back in the Football League, they’re a big-sized club with good support. They’ve worked hard to get back and they will be competitive,” said the boss.
“They will make us work hard, but we couldn’t have worked any harder against Accrington or Bristol City or on Saturday. Hard work is the norm for us.”