Harford impressed by Town's handling of Akinfenwa threat

With the Chairboys’ clearly attempting to play to their hefty attacker’s physical presence throughout, sending a number of long balls in his vicinity, they were regularly repelled by Sonny Bradley and Matty Pearson.

The visitors only had three shots on target during the 90 minutes, none coming from their imposing centre forward, as Harford said: “When Akinfenwa, who’s a real, real handful, when he plays, you know Wycombe are going to play a certain way and they’re going to get balls into him.

“He’s a better player than people give him credit for, in terms of his technique and hold up play, and his strength and power.

“So I thought as they have been all season, Matty Pearson and Sonny Bradley were immense in terms of dealing with a big threat.”

Harford had also told the Hatters’ squad to not lose their cool in the face of Wycombe’s usual antics of slowing the game down at every opportunity possible, which they definitely heeded, taking the lead through James Collins just after the half hour, George Moncur’s late double sealing victory.

He continued: “We warned the players what was going to happen.

“They showed a real good discipline, as we knew it was going to be a knock down, second balls, got to win the fight, had to get through that bit and then we had to play our football.

“I think overall, they did the job to a tee and in my opinion, got the result they fully deserved.”

Goalscorer Collins admitted his side had taken the instructions on board, adding: “We know what sort of game it’s going to be against Wycombe and to be fair to them, they’re really good at what they do.

“They made it difficult for us again, but I think we kept our composure, played our stuff and once we got that first goal, we kicked on and went on to win the game.”