Jones left to rue lack of clinical edge
Hatters manager Nathan Jones admitted the lack of a cutting edge in front of goal cost the Town dear in their 2-0 defeat to Notts County at Kenilworth Road.
Town had numerous opportunities in the first half, but were unable to convert as they went into the break goalless before an Alan Sheehan own goal and a Jon Stead strike sealed a defeat.
But in spite of Jones’ first defeat at the Hatters helm, Jones feels the overall performance was not deserving of a third successive home shutout.
He told our official YouTube channel: “Overall I’m disappointed. At times we were very good and dominated in possession.
“We tried to do things we’ve implemented and created a lot of chances, but that lack of killer edge has cost us.
“But defensively we’ve got to be better, because we were excellent in the last two matches. They probably had four chances and took two of them and we’ve got to be better than that.”
The Town were fluid in the their first-half display, with the midfield trio of Cameron McGeehan, Pelly Ruddock and Paddy McCourt all forming opportunities in support of Craig Mackail-Smith.
Yet despite the 14 shots in the match, the Hatters weren’t able to convert having dominated large parts of the match.
“There were some real good chances first half. Paddy had one, Pelly also had a couple, and there were some other half-chances too,” Jones added.
“There was one off the line second half too and plenty of balls in the box, but today they were far more clinical than we were.
“At times I thought we were excellent. Some of our approach play and what we did was very, very good. We moved the ball well.”
Jones was also left disappointed at the nature of the two goals conceded, feeling that Stead was allowed to do too much while to earn his place on the scoresheet.
“It wasn’t lack of concentration, just people doing their jobs. There were fundamentals there that we put in place, but it was too easy for them to get the ball in our box,” he said.
“The ball comes across and he [Alan] has to defend and it just comes off him unluckily, but things happened in the build-up that shouldn’t have happened, and that’s why we’ve lost the game.
“The second goal was a poor goal to give away, bad decisions have been made, but that happens. Overall though I was unhappy that we couldn’t see out the game and go on and win.
“They were reasonably direct and lived on the knock downs, and having that game-plan so they were always liable to get something. As it was, they scored from areas I wouldn’t expect us to concede from but that’s football.”