Burke wants Luton to repeat 'fighting' second half Villa display at Crystal Palace

​Luton defender Reece Burke wants the Hatters to take their second half performance against Aston Villa into the start of what is a crucial Premier League trip to Crystal Palace this weekend.

​Town had found themselves trailing 2-0 on home soil for the third league game in a row on Saturday, following a subdued opening 45 minutes, before mounting a terrific fightback after the break, drawing level through Tahith Chong and Carlton Morris. It was to ultimately prove fruitless when Lucas Digne headed in a last minute winner, but Burke demanded a repeat of that second period display at Selhurst Park, saying: “We’ll take that into the next game and try and start games how we finished.

"The next few games are big, big games for us, I think we know that, in terms of trying to get some points on the board. So we need to keep pushing on and fighting, but we’ve got a great bunch of lads and I’m sure we can do that. Hopefully that gives us a big boost and the lads can come out fighting straight away, we start the game a lot better than we did.”

On what he felt was wrong with that opening 45 minutes, in which saw Town forced to make a change within five minutes when centre half Amari’i Bell went off injured, Ollie Watkins the scoring twice for a visiting team who but for Thomas Kaminski, would have put the game to bed, Burke continued: “The first half was a bit difficult losing Belly early on, but we’re gutted as a team. The first half wasn’t good enough from us, none of us were happy when we came in at half time, a few discussions, I think we knew what we needed to do as a team.

“Even the staff, we just knew we weren’t where we can be and it’s been like that previously as well, starting games slow and chasing them. We’ve got a great bunch of lads and I don’t think we’ll ever go under, so it was pleasing in those terms. As a team, I know we’ve got great characters and I think that’s why we’ve always done so well. We were disappointed with the way we played the first half, we caused ourselves problems with our silly mistakes, but second half was a lot better, a great performance for us and I think we deserved at least a point in that game.”

Although Town got themselves back into the game thanks to those goals from Chong and Morris, the Hatters couldn’t secure another valuable point in their battle to stay up, Digne escaping from Issa Kabore to head Moussa Diaby’s cross beyond Kaminski in the final seconds. It was a tough one for Burke to take, as he added: “It was better second half, the lads came out fighting and again we did manage to get ourselves back in the game and looked like we were the ones who could have nicked it. We got ourselves back in it but to come out of the game with no points is disappointing, as we thought worst case we’d get away with a point

“I know second half they dropped off a little bit but I felt our intensity, our ball speed was much better in the second half. Everyone was winning our duels a little bit more than we were in the first half, we were really getting to grips with the game, I think you could see that, so we’re gutted to concede a goal like that, it was really a kick in the teeth.

“I thought second half we were the better team, the way we carried ourselves was good. We made a few more subs, Hashi’s (Daiki Hashioka) come on, he’s not really played a lot for us, but I thought he was brilliant. Everyone who came on did well and at half time it was like a reality check to get everyone firing again and I think that’s what happened.

“We got ourselves back into it but disappointing with the last goal and to come out of the game with no points is disappointing. We need to learn from it (late goal), I know the last goal’s a killer, but even probably the first two aren’t good enough, so we need to look at that and get better.”