Jones wants to see a reaction from his Hatters side

Glen Rea in action during Luton's heavy defeat to Port Vale

Town saw their 12 match unbeaten run ended in comprehensive fashion by the Valiants, beaten for only the fourth time this season.

Every other time Hatters have lost in the league so far, they have bounced back with a victory in their following league clash, and Jones wants to that follow suit today, saying: “The last game we lost, we lost 3-0 at home to Coventry having a man sent off and then we didn’t lose in three months.

“So if we have that kind of reaction I’ll be well happy.

“We have to do that as we have to show what a good side we are, as you don’t get to where are without being a good side.

“We’ve had a bad day but we’ll be ready and we’ll go again on Monday as that’s the important thing now.”

Despite suffering a heaviest loss of his managerial tenure at Vale Park, Jones was gracious in his assessment of the game afterwards.

He continued: “It was just a day where we got beaten, we got beaten fair and square.

“Others have said they’re disgusted, I’m not disgusted, this is a one-off.

“This is a difficult place to come to and as I said, it wasn’t a classic from our point of view, but they thoroughly deserved it.

“Let’s give them credit, because we’ve won 8-2 and 7-0 and 7-1 and 5-0 and no-one's come out and said 'they’re a good side, Luton are a good side.'

“It’s always been 'well, we haven’t done this, we haven’t done that.’

“We gifted them three goals, but they were better than us, all over.

“It’s really, really disappointing to come here, in the form we are, we wanted to finish the year off well, we’re in wonderful form, we’ve had a great month, and we met a Port Vale side who are in good form.

“The pitch was a real problem, it really was, but that wasn’t why we lost it, that’s why we weren’t as fluent as we were, because the pitch wasn’t conducive enough to do that.

“We picked a side that was going to get into our front men, but we were nowhere near all afternoon.”

With second placed Notts County losing as well, it meant Luton will start 2018 with a four point advantage over their nearest rivals, although Jones wasn’t fussed by results elsewhere.

He added: “All we can do is do our own thing.

“We’re not concerned with Notts County, not concerned with anyone, all we’re concerned with is us. If we win games, we get what we want to do.”