Hatters midfielder keeping everything crossed he is fit for crunch Bolton trip

Hatters midfielder Jordan Clark is keeping everything crossed that he can feature for Luton in their play-off decider at Bolton Wanderers on Saturday.

The 32-year-old has been a huge reason why Town are in contention for the top six at all this term, currently the club’s leading marksman with 12 goals already this term, his best ever haul since turning professional, including an important winner during the 1-0 success over Blackpool back in January.

However, he went off in the 2-1 win over Northampton Town earlier this month with what was later revealed to be a calf injury, an issue that has kept him out of the last three matches. Although Luton have been able to take seven points from nine without Clark, having the long serving midfielder available for the trip to the Toughsheet Stadium would certainly be a boost for the visitors as they need victory and other results to go their way in order to have any hope of breaking into the top six on the final day.

Speaking about his chances before sweeping the boards at the Luton Town Supporters’ Trust presentation evening on Tuesday, winning four awards including Supporters’ Player and Players’ Player of the Year for the second season running, giving an update on his fitness, Clark said: “I’m feeling better. I had a little muscle injury which wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be, but to miss the last few games has been tough as I’m not a great watcher of the games anymore.

"I get a bit more nervous than I do when I’m playing, so just hopefully I can be available. I’ve done a little bit of running with the physios and the fitness guys, so I’m touching all the wood I can at the minute. I felt okay today, Thursday, Friday, I’ll probably be hopefully joining in a little bit of teamwork and tactical stuff, so hopefully come Thursday I feel good again and can put myself forward for selection.”

Having been on the field for 82 minutes against the Cobblers, a game that had come just three days after he completed 90 minutes in the 3-1 Vertu Trophy final victory over Stockport County at Wembley, Clark, who sent two wonderful chances over the bar in the second period, had been desperate to stay on and do all he could to try and secure the vital three points.

Leaving the field with the scores tied at 1-1, it meant that he had a watching brief when Kal Naismith delivered his magical free kick into the top corner from 30 yards to secure another precious victory, as he continued: “It was a massive game, we had such a great occasion at Wembley, it was great to win that trophy and you want to kick on until the end of the season, but the Northampton game probably came a little bit too soon.

"It’s the old cliche that the Wembley pitch is huge, I did a lot of running that day and felt like I played a lot of full games in a short space of time during the last month or two and it probably just caught up with me. It was a bit of an up and down feeling as I missed two great chances in the game. I missed the first one and thought I can’t go off now, if this is 1-1 and the season it feels it’ll be done, I won’t be able to live with myself.

"Then when I missed the second one when I blazed it over with my left foot I was like, ‘oh no.’ They took me off and I was gutted, I was thinking about crying a little bit, but then when you see Kal pushed a few boys out of the way and just whipped it in the top corner, the celebration was great as well. I was buzzing for Kal as he deserved that. He’ll admit himself, he hasn’t performed to his levels in the first half of the season, but I think last two, three months he’s been one of our best players. He loves this club and I’m really, really pleased for him.”

Luton’s 2-1 success over Barnsley on Saturday, courtesy of a late winner from Kasey Palmer, plus Stockport’s defeat to Port Vale in midweek, means the Hatters can catch three of the teams in the top six in the season finale, as they have eyes on both Bradford City and Stevenage as well. Having struggled hugely at times this term, including a run of just six wins from 18 matches, Town have managed to turn things around quite astonishingly to go on a run of eight wins from 10 games, with just one defeat in their last 16 fixtures.

Giving his thoughts on Town putting themselves in the mix with one match left after what had been on the whole a hugely disappointing campaign, Clark added: “I’m very proud. We all know how tough it was at the start of the season and the turnaround’s been unbelievable. Full credit to the coaching staff for that, they’ve found a system that’s working for us and the personnel and the little things we needed for Jack (Wilshere) to implement and us to finally get used to it really and I think you can see that now.

"It’s quite a settled side lately, we’ve had a lot of big players come back. The January transfer window has been a big blessing for us, some of the players have been in such good form, Kasey for example, young Emilio (Lawrence) and Hakeem (Odoffin) who’s come in, we’ve kept him fit which has been massive for us. Everyone else has jumped on that really, we’re on a roll and have got momentum now, just hopefully it continues on to Saturday. There’s just one more hurdle, we need a little bit of luck from elsewhere, but I think we’ve earned that bit of luck now and hopefully we can get in.”