Bowyer: We would have beaten Luton with the diamond

The Addicks chief has 12 senior players unavailable at the moment, including star strike Lyle Taylor, and had to hand 19-year-old midfielder Albie Morgan his full Championship debut during the 2-1 defeat.

Bowyer had masterminded Charlton to four points against the Hatters last term, a 2-2 draw on their travels, before engineering a 3-1 success later in the campaign at the Valley to end Town’s 28-game unbeaten run.

However, Graeme Jones' side got their revenge thanks to goals from Pelly-Ruddock Mpanzu and Izzy Brown, as speaking after the result which saw his side stretch their own winless run to six games, Bowyer said: “I’d have loved to come here tonight with, not even a full squad, but just to have been able to play the diamond.

“I couldn’t play the diamond, that’s our favourite formation, but we couldn’t play that tonight, because we just haven’t got the personnel with injuries in midfield.

“We lost two at the weekend, so now we can’t even play the way we want to play, that’s how they play.

“Last season we played them twice at it and we were better than them twice.

"I knew if we had come here and played that formation we’d win the game, but we haven’t got the players to do it.

“I won’t use injuries as an excuse though, I won’t and I’ve just told the players the same.

“It’s tough for us at the moment, but we have to find a way to get back to winning ways.

“We’re scoring goals, creating is not a problem and that’s where all our injuries are.

“Out of all the injuries we have, 12 injuries we’ve got, and only one of them is a defender.

“So our stronger part of the squad at the moment is defensively and we’re conceding goals where we’ve got some may attacking players out, but we’re still creating chances and scoring.

“So it’s frustrating, but we’ll keep working.”