Hatters boss proud of his side's character as Town bounce back from Blues debacle to keep a clean sheet against United

Hatters boss Nathan Jones was left with a real sense of pride in his side’s performance as they bounced back from last weekend’s drubbing at the hands of Birmingham City by keeping a clean sheet during this afternoon’s 0-0 draw with Sheffield United.

Following a match that Town were breached five times, as the Blues looked a threat every time they sent the ball into Luton’s box, against the Blades, recently relegated from the Premier League, it was a completely different story.

Bar one early chance for George Baldock and a second half header by Oli McBurnie, centre halves Reece Burke, on his debut, and the outstanding Kal Naismith made sure they cleared everything that came their way, ensuring Simon Sluga kept one of his more simple clean sheets of the season.

They were backed up by an excellent display from Gabe Osho in the holding role, his first outing as a defensive midfielder, as the Blades didn’t even threaten from set-plays, an area Town had looked increasingly suspect from the previous weekend.

Speaking afterwards, Jones said: “I thought we did enough to win the game but what I’m really pleased with and what shows what we have here is just how we bounced back from last week.

“We had to take one, and the underlying thing is we’re constantly punching above our weight at this level.

"So now and again we’re going to take one on the nose and sometimes we have and it’s about how we react and we reacted fantastically well.

“We bounced back, we don’t often go very long without winning and having defeat after defeat and that shows we have massive amounts of character.

"Today we went toe-to-toe with Sheffield United, one of the favourites for the league, and these will click as they’ve got some fantastic players, but I thought we were excellent from start to finish.

“We did all the basics well, pressed well, denied them, they had one chance in the first minute, but apart from that, very little.

"We had the better chances, scored a goal which is probably onside (through Fred Onyedinma), then had another opportunity that the ref’s brought back early when Fred’s in.

"Elijah’s (Adebayo) had a great chance, Harry (Cornick) hit the bar, I really thought it was a good performance from us.

"We bounced back and I’m proud of the club today.”

Although Town have conceded eight goals in the second tier this term, they have still managed three shut-outs from their opening give games, as Jones added: “There’s not many that keep three clean sheets out of five, not many that keep 60 per cent clean sheets in the Championship.

“You have to do well and we've played a variety of teams.

“We’ve gone away to Barnsley which is a tough tough place to go, gone away to West Brom, obviously we haven't kept a clean sheet there, but it’s the accumulation of them and then you have the performance we did against Birmingham.

“But we bounced back fantastically well and it shows that we’ve got one, good players, but two, great, great characters, so I'm really pleased.