Form is key to Still’s Luton Town team selection

Playing players in form has been key to Hatters boss John Still’s team selection so far this season, writes Mark Wood.
L13-998   13/8/13   MBLN
LTFC v Salisbury City.
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LTFC v Salisbury City.
wk 33 MS JX
L13-998 13/8/13 MBLN LTFC v Salisbury City. wk 33 MS JX

A number of Luton’s players put in superb performances during pre-season but have failed to deliver since the season started, with Luton labouring to a 1-0 defeat at Southport on the opening day before grinding out a 2-0 home win over promoted Salisbury City on Tuesday night.

Supersub Andre Gray, meanwhile, hadn’t performed well during pre-season but has shone after coming on in both of the recent games.

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Still said: “I think Andre will be the first to admit that pre-season wasn’t his best, but there’s nothing wrong with that, he showed last year when I came here that he’s a decent player and a valued player.

“But if I look around at pre-season I think the last couple of performances were better. He came on late in the second half against Arsenal and got two goals and I think they were probably his only two goals of pre-season.

“But Mark Cullen was scoring, and Jake Howells was scoring, and I think he just started a bit slow. So I thought we’ll use him as an impact because that can change games and hopefully that will bring out his best form because at his best form he’d be in the team.

“If I picked a team of people that were out of form in pre-season people would think I was mad. Can you make an exception? Yeah, I suppose you can make an exception, but who do you make the exception with?”

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And Still is determined to continue to do what he believes to be right, saying: “When you do this job you have a duty of care as well. If he isn’t quite at his best and he starts and he doesn’t do great, it’s going to take him a little bit of time perhaps to get it right. Coming on in games it might give us a little bit of spark.

“Is there a right and wrong? Probably not, but there’s a right and wrong for me.”

But Still admitted it was important not to be ‘fooled’ by pre-season where the Hatters had performed so well.

He continued: “As I said before people do get fooled by pre-season, they shouldn’t be. You hope your players are fit, organised and know their jobs. The rest comes with games. Pre-season games don’t really tell a tale of your season I don’t think.

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“We had a great pre-season and it was a great pre-season because we were fit and organised and everyone knowing their jobs. The real stuff’s started now so it needs the games to get going.

“We were poor on Saturday and we were efficient I think is the right word on Tuesday.

“Efficient knowing that whoever we play here will probably come and try and make it hard for us.

“But we have to try and overcome that.”

Still insists that his side will have to earn the right to play by working hard first, but believes it is then that his stars’ quality will be able to tell.

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He added: “I think we have individuals who are capable of lighting the blue touch paper and just setting us alight. I think we have individuals who can do that and I think that’s what we’re going to need, solid performances and someone just to come up with something that can help break the team down.

“I thought the other night we didn’t look like losing, but it was whether we could get the goal that we needed and I think the goal when it came settled us down quite well and I thought we were in proper control then without ever being in danger before, but it was only an efficient performance, it wasn’t a great performance.

“But I would have settled for an efficient performance away at Southport because you need that efficiency, you need to have the same level of work-rate every week, and if you get that, that’s when your players of quality come into it.

“It’s really interesting, I spoke to my pal who went to the Community Shield on Sunday and he said for large parts of the game Wigan had as much of the ball as Manchester United, but (Robin) Van Persie lit the blue touch paper and that’s the difference I think you get from hopefully what you might think are slightly better players than the other team’s.

“They can be organised, they can be disciplined, they can make it difficult for you, but it’s having enough players in your team that can come up with something that provides the spark.”

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