Hatters chief was never settling for a mid-table finish

The Hatters made their return to the third tier of English football by winning promotion from League Two last term.

Although some fans stated on social media they would be satisfied with consolidating in the division, it wasn’t what Jones had in mind when preparing for the season ahead.

He said: “I’m not sure that many fans would have been happy for us just settling for mid-table, that’s not what we’ve come into the league for.

“Whatever level, wherever we finish, what we will do is make sure we’re very, very competitive in every game.

“We want to finish as high as we can and we are a good side, we believe that.

“We work hard, we’ve got good processes, got good players, got a good way of working, so we believe we’re very well equipped for the level.

“Now where that takes us, we won’t know, but we know we’re in good form, we believe we’re a good side, because I’m not naive and I’m not delusional.

“I say what I see, I’m like Roy Walker, I say what I see, so if we’re a good side, I tell players because I believe it.

“I’ve watched games and there’s no-one in this league that are streets ahead of us in any way, shape or form. So we know we’re going to be competitive if we’re at the levels which we demand.”

That has proved to be the case so far this season, with Luton sitting fifth in the table after a run of six wins from 10 games with just one defeat.

On whether the club were where he expected to be, Jones added: “We’re in decent form we have been for a while actually.

“Apart from Barnsley and Peterborough, we’ve probably deserved to get something out of every game we’ve played.

“So for me, I’m enjoying the form we’re in, but we know we’ve got to continue that.

“We had a very, very good month, culminating in a fantastic week to finish the month off, but now we want to make sure that we continue that form.

“I don’t think we’ve surpassed anything and we didn’t expect it, what we want to do is make sure that we’re always building for this level.

“We felt that we would always be competitive at this level, and we are proving to be that, very competitive.

“We knew we’d do that, so I expected to be very competitive at this level.

“In terms of league position and points gained, you can’t put an exact figure on where you want to be, I don’t think that’s possible.

“But nothing has surprised me, nothing has shocked me in terms of where we are, or anything.

“There’s a few results where I honestly do believe we should have more points.

“The games that we’ve won, we’ve deserved to win, we very rarely have nicked games.

“The games that we’ve lost, I felt we should have got something from two of the four games.

“So I feel we are in the position we deserve to be in, but that doesn’t surprise me.”