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Club News

Watch | Nathan Jones' pre-Blackburn press conference

27 January 2022

Club News

Watch | Nathan Jones' pre-Blackburn press conference

27 January 2022

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Manager Nathan Jones will utilise his squad as the relentless Championship fixture list continues against Blackburn Rovers on Saturday.

After making six changes for the midweek win against Bristol City, with some enforced and some to freshen the team up, he reiterated the importance of the squad particularly in this period.

"It is so important because we made six changes the other day and three or four of those were enforced. We’re then looking after one or two people like Allan Campbell, who when he plays is like the Duracell bunny but with that comes a risk. Elijah is exactly the same and Pelly-Ruddock Mpanzu is churning out performances.

"You have to be careful, use your squad and be sensible whilst always keeping performance and results at the forefront."

Fred Onyedinma is amongst those pushing for a start after making an impact off the bench on Tuesday night and Jones said: "Everyone has a role to play. Maybe if we started Fred and give him a full 90 he would contribute but maybe he wouldn’t. He always gives us something, he always comes on and gives us something, so that could be a little role at this time, so we’ll just see.

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"It's not that we don’t trust him to start, of course we trust him to start, he’s done wonderful when he starts, but we have to think about one, the freshness of the team and two, what do we need in the early stages of the game. Is it going to be a tight game, are we going to need that physicality and then when the game opens up, what do we need then to threaten?

"Fred comes into that category as give him time and space when the game opens up, that’s when he’s even more dangerous."

Saturday's meeting with Blackburn will mean that the Hatters have taken on the top three in their last four home league matches and undoubtedly, the gaffer is expecting another tough challenge.

"It’s going to be a very difficult game. We’ve had some real good games against Blackburn. We’ve got good memories against them from when we stayed up. 

"They’ve been a Premier League side, they’ve been a Championship side, League One for a short period of time, and then went back up. But they’ve got a really experienced manager, a real good group of players. The games that we play against them are usually very tight and marginal, so it’s going to be a really tough game."


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