Hatters boss explains why he didn't recall influential centre half against Boro

Hatters boss Matt Bloomfield has explained why he didn’t recall influential defender Kal Naismith to the first XI that were held to a goalless draw by Middlesbrough at Kenilworth Road on Saturday.

The 31-year-old centre half, who joined on loan from Bristol City during the January transfer window, returning for a second spell with the club, had looked back to somewhere near his best when starting against Sheffield United, Plymouth Argyle and Portsmouth recently. However, he was then sent off for two rash tackles just 19 minutes into the game at Burnley, a match that Town went on to lose 4-0, meaning he sat out of Tuesday night’s 2-1 victory over Cardiff in Wales, as Luton ended their near six month wait for an away triumph.

Available to face Boro, many had thought that Bloomfield would restore the former Scottish youth international to the back three with one of Christ Makosso, Mark McGuinness or Amari’i Bell missing out. However, that wasn’t the case, as it was Naismith on the bench and with Town denying their visitors a single shot on target throughout the 90 minutes, although unable to take any of their 19 attempts at the other end, the manager felt it proved to be a call that worked out.

Asked why he had gone with the same back three, he said: “I thought defensively we were excellent on Tuesday night and defensively I thought we were excellent again today. Kal’s a top performer and someone who we all think extremely highly of, as do our supporters and as do the coaching staff. It’s why we brought him back in January, but it felt like the right decision to stick with the same back three. I’m not sure it was an easy choice to leave any of them out, so the decision was to stick with the same team and on the balance of play I think that was the right decision.”

After a dominant first half in which Luton wasted three golden opportunities through Thelo Aasgaard twice and Elijah Adebayo, with Liam Walsh having three attempts and Carlton Morris denied by two Mark Travers’ saves, the hosts struggled to maintain that kind of momentum in the second period although still went close through Mark McGuinness’s towering header and a late Lasse Nordas shot.

On not being able to reach the heights from the opening 45 minutes, Bloomfield added: The lads kept probing. We’re playing against a team trying to get promoted out of the division and after that first half it was going to be extremely tough to replicate that second half considering the calibre of the opposition, but we still created some clear-cut chances. On another day we could take one of those second half just as much as one of the ones in the first half but it wasn’t to be.”