Edwards pleased with Adebayo's reaction as Town boss is given 'food for thought' by striker's efforts against Burnley

Luton boss Rob Edwards has been pleased with the reaction of striker Elijah Adebayo to being left on the bench recently, insisting he has been given a real selection headache going into this afternoon’s home game against Tottenham Hotspur.

The 25-year-old had started all of Town’s first three Premier League matches this term, before the Hatters opted to go for a slightly more defensive formation to try and plug the gaps at the back ahead of the Fulham trip, operating with just Carlton Morris as the lone frontman.

It meant that Adebayo was the one to drop out of the side, playing just 33 minutes in the three games that followed, only coming on in the closing stages each time.

However, with Luton trailing 1-0 to Burnley on Tuesday night, the forward had his longest run-out in the league since starting against West Ham, introduced early in the second half as Town hunted an equaliser, Tahith Chong into the fray soon afterwards as well.

The pair both played pivotal parts in the Hatters drawing level, Chong’s cross nodded down by Reece Burke for Adebayo to find the net with his first goal of the season and first since scoring at Sunderland in the Championship play-off final first leg.

Although Town cruelly conceded just a matter of seconds after kick-off, the Clarets claiming a 2-1 victory, on Adebayo and Chong’s impact, Edwards said: “It’s important for forwards to score goals and be a threat.

"I’m not solely looking at that, but when he came on to the pitch, it was to try and change the game and get us back into it, we were 1-0 down at the time and he did do that.

"I was pleased with his reaction and whenever he’s come on, in the few games where he’s not started, he has contributed well and again, we need that now.

"We had a slight tweak in the shape and are playing with only one out and out number nine at times in certain games.

"Eli’s had to be a bit patient in the last couple of weeks, so it was good he took his chance when it came.

“It does give me food for thought but it does again show me we’ve got a good group here and if I need to to change it somehow and find a way to get us back into a game, or we were winning last week at Everton and we wanted to solidify, we’ve got good options.

"The squad depth is way deeper than what we had last season which is great for us, we can now make changes and affect the game either way, and he did really well.”

With Adebayo now up and running for the season, team-mate Morris also on three, then if the pair can become regular scorers, it will obviously only help boost Town’s chances of survival.

Their tallies aren’t the only thing that Edwards is keeping a close eye on though, as he continued: “You want your strikers scoring goals, but I read an article the other day about you don’t necessarily have to have someone, an individual getting double figures.

"It would be great if we do or even a couple, that would be incredible for us, but as long as we've got a consistent goal flow from around the group.

"We’ve had a couple of defenders chipping in now, had a couple of forwards off the mark which is really good, forwards always want goals as that’s what they feel they’re judged on.

"I’ll be looking at other things as well, I’ll be looking at how hard they work and how hard they press, how well they hold the ball up and how much of a team player they are as well.

"Because there’s lots of time in the game where we haven’t got the ball and we’ve got to look at the structure and get those things right as well, and I can really trust our players.”

The fact that both Adebayo and Morris have netted in the Premier League should give the pair added confidence they have what it takes to cut it at this level going into this afternoon’s contest with a Spurs side who are looking to move to the top of the table.

Edwards wants that kind of confidence to begin sweeping through the entire squad, as he added: “The players are learning quickly, they’re seeing things slightly quicker, they have adjusted and are still adjusting to the level and what the games have thrown at us.

"If you look at the stats and look at the data, I know that doesn’t win football matches, you've got to go and score more goals than the opposition, but there's a lot of good stuff there that shows maybe we should be a little bit above where we currently are.

"If we can continue the performance levels then hopefully that stands us in good stead as the season pans out.

“Without that belief it’s going to be hard to go over the white line and play the game and perform to the level that we’re going to need to.

"I think we’ve all seen that over the seven games now, seen certain people stepping up and almost growing in front of our eyes which is great to see.

"It's our job to keep making sure that belief remains and stays, that confidence, we’ll get that with performances, we’ll get that certainly with results as well.

"I think everyone now has seen us over the last couple of weeks and have gone, ‘they've got something there, there’s a way of playing here now it can be effective.’

"We’ll always try to play to our strengths and try to find a way to win the game, we’re going to try to win this game on Saturday.”