Bloomfield backs Luton's young defenders after a tough night at the Stadium of Light

Luton boss Matt Bloomfield will continue to back young defenders Joe Johnson and Reuell Walters after Wednesday night’s 2-0 defeat at Sunderland.

The pair had kept their places from the 1-1 draw at Sheffield Wednesday in Town’s last match earlier this month, but found it incredibly tough going, Walters in particular, on Wearside. The former Arsenal youngster found himself with the challenge of marking winger Enzo Le Fée, who joined Serie A side Roma for a fee of around £20m in the summer, and had played in Europa League for the I Giallorossi earlier in the campaign.

Loaned to the Black Cats, the 25-year-old gave Walters the run-around in the first period, scoring the opening goal of the game as well when Town’s defence simply stood off him and invited him to shoot, which he did with unerring precision, powering past a clearly unimpressed Thomas Kaminski. Although Le Fee was the standout performer during the opening 45 minutes, Walters did deserve credit for sticking to his task, as after the break, he didn’t have the same impact on proceedings, Town’s young defender even able to venture forward himself somewhat as the game progressed.

On the other side Johnson had former Manchester City winger Patrick Roberts for company, a player who cost Pep Guardiola £11m back in 2018. The England U19 international was able to keep the ex-Girona and Middlesbrough attacker on a slightly tighter leash, as although catching the eye with his darts forward, he wasn’t able to set up a goal for the hosts.

Discussing the pair, who have just 25 senior league matches between them, as opposed to almost 400 for the duo they were up against, Bloomfield said: “I’m not sure if you’re going to find two tougher wingers to play up against, especially away from home. They’re young boys, they’re learning the game and they’re going to learn a lot from their experience tonight, but they need to learn and they need to learn quick.

"We’re backing them, they’re young players for our football club and we believe in them and believe in what they’re going to do for us. We spoke before the game about Sunderland’s wrong-footed wide players wanting to come inside and shoot. We wanted to force them outside on the pitch, but we didn’t and ultimately we paid the price. If they’re not going to learn from tonight then they’ll never learn as they’re up against top quality opposition players, who on a big pitch are able to have time and space to go and run at them.

"So they’re learning the game, they’ve not got a huge amount of experience between them, but they’re working hard every single day in training. We need to learn the lessons as quickly as possible, we’re obviously short of a little bit of Championship experience right now, but the boys are giving us everything. They’re trying to improve, they’re desperate to improve, they are improving, they’re believing in what they’re trying to do and I’ll take players like that any day of the week.”

When he was searching for positives from the latest defeat which saw the Hatters drop to the bottom of the table, Bloomfield did point to the efforts of both Walters and Nelson along with some of his other players, adding: “Second half, Reuell Walters was very good, Zack Nelson was very, very good in both positions, he’s going to be a massive player for our football club, make no mistake about that.

“More experience for Joe Johnson, it was great to get Kal (Naismith) on the pitch for a period of time. He’s obviously a real leader, a big character for us and he’s someone who we hope will have a real big imprint in the rest of the season. More minutes for Thelo (Aasgaard), we didn’t give him enough opportunity to go and create in attacking areas, so there were a few positives in there. I’ve learned a hell of a lot as well which I think is really, really important, and we’ll see this as fuel to move forward.”