Rams boss Cocu admits his side were 'fortunate' in Town win

The hosts took the lead on 11 minutes after a terrible error from Luton keeper Simon Sluga, who under no pressure, allowed Matty Pearson's backpass to elude his control and roll into the empty net.

Then, with Town on top, Sluga was beaten at his near post by Tom Lawrence's cross to end any hopes of a fight back by the visitors.

Former Barcelona star and Dutch midfielder Cocu said: "Maybe the goals we got were fortunate a little bit.

The first goal I didn’t even see; we were talking as a staff and I had turn my head to the pitch and it was in!

“Then for the second goal if I was Tom Lawrence, I would say it was his intention to shoot.

"It is a great goal and now you see when it goes your way the details can decide.

“We had two good opportunities on goal we didn’t score, we could have but we didn’t. That is how football is sometimes.”

Although Derby started the better, there was nothing between the sides for large parts of the encoutner, with Luton if anything, looking the more likely to score for the majority of the second period.

However, they failed to do so, ex-Hatter Curtis Davies and on-loan Brighton centre back Matt Clarke producing good performances, as Cocu added: "It is great to get the result and also the clean sheet is something inside our team that we really wanted to pull off today.

“I think in the first half of the game we did quite well; we kept the ball well and we created chances.

“Maybe in the second half we went a bit too far back, so when you win the ball back the distance is really far to go to the offensive part of the opponents.

“That was maybe the small detail that we could do better, but we stayed in the game and after we got the second goal we kept the clean sheet.

“I think it’s an important win after the draw at Barnsley, and the late equaliser they got. I think we can all be happy with the three points.”