Luton chief expecting Premier League relegation battle to go to the wire

Luton boss Rob Edwards is preparing himself and his players for the Premier League relegation battle to go right to the wire this season.

The Hatters find themselves in what now looks like a three-way battle along with Everton and Nottingham Forest to stay up, although second bottom Burnley, who travel to rock bottom Sheffield United this afternoon, are still not quite out of the equation just yet. Town can give their chances of remaining in the top flight a huge boost by beating Brentford at Kenilworth Road today, especially with the Toffees and Reds facing each other at Goodison Park tomorrow afternoon.

Whatever happens, with so few points separating the teams who are all jockeying to finish above the dotted line, Edwards is fully expecting it to be in the balance in just under a month’s time, as asked if thought it would go down to the final day, speaking yesterday, he said: “Looking at it right now, you’d probably think so wouldn’t you? And we’ve been comfortable with that right from the beginning.

"Would we take that? Going all the way to the last day if our fate was in our hands? Probably we would as we’re in there (relegation zone) at the moment, so if we still are then we’ve done something right over the next four games, starting tomorrow, that shows why tomorrow is so important.”

Should the fight for survival go down to the home clash with the Cottagers, it is an escapology act that the Hatters, who famously stayed up on the final day of the Division One season back in 1983 when winning 1-0 at Manchester City thanks to Raddy Antic’s goal, also beating Derby County 3-2 at the Baseball Ground in 1990, have always had in in the backs of their mind.

Edwards continued: “At the beginning, we knew it was always going to come down to these final five games, so we’re all right with that, we’re cool with that. We’ve spoken about that honestly with the group from the beginning of this week. I don’t think City was ever going to be defining for us, but these next five will be, clearly. We know how important all these next five are and our aim, I know this is going to be very difficult to win all of them, but our aim is to pick up points in all of those games.

“Also the fact that we knew what fight we’d be in from the very beginning, so we’re okay with it. We wanted to pick up more points of course, every team can say they’ve left points out there at certain stages, but what I’ve seen is a team that’s grown in performance levels and has competed with the very best teams consistently throughout the season and that makes me very, very proud. The fact that we’re going into the final five games of the season with as good a chance as anyone, fills me with a lot of confidence.”

Luton and Edwards are also used to having matches with so much riding on them as well, the Hatters reaching the play-offs last season and having a Great Escape back in the 2019-20 campaign. Town’s chief was also winning the League Two title with Forest Green back in 2022 too, as he said: “At this stage of the season over the last few years I’ve been used to it.

"Forest Green we were going for the league title which ended up being on the last day, last year we were going to the play-off final which was last, last, last day and I said it to our supporters. I had an event with some of our supporters and I said that I’ve got a feeling that one could be the same, so we’ve just got to be ready for that.

"We’ve talked about that openly, we’ve put it (pressure) on them at certain stages of the season and they’ve responded well. We did that last season in big games and they responded well. The players are realistic, they all know what’s at stake now, they know the importance of these games, so there’s no point hiding away from it now, it’s making it bring out the best of us.

"I enjoy the challenge of it, the pressure of it, hopefully it brings out the best in me as well as our players. Don’t get me wrong I’d love to be sitting here in the 40s points wise and be able to chill out a bit, but we’re in that position we’re in now and I love it, I would have it any other way.”