Hatters wingers ready to face Rovers

LUTON Town winger Andy Drury is expected to be fit to face Forest Green Rovers on Tuesday night despite coming off against Eastbourne Borough at the weekend, writes Mike Simmonds,

The summer signing from Stevenage Borough was replaced late on by Dan Walker, but Hatters boss Richard Money confirmed it was nothing to worry about.

Speaking to the press this afternoon, he said: “He’s fine. He’s trained this morning, he just came off for a little bit of cramp for which he has had a huge ribbing from the team from.”

French wideman Claude Gnakpa should also return to the squad after completing his one match ban on Saturday. Money said: “It’s good to have him back. He’s a very dangerous player for us. Any team in this division would miss a player of his quality.”

Neither striker Kevin Gallen or Taiwo Atieno will make the clash with Rovers, who currently sit second bottom of the Blue Square Bet Premier after losing 1-0 at home to Histon at the weekend.

The boss continued: “They are taking their course, they’re not easy to deal with, or easy to rush.

“So they will take their course, neither are fit or available for tomorrow.”

Defender Shane Blackett also was absent from the squad for the trip to Priory Lane, though he was there in a training capacity before kick off, and the boss confirmed it was a selection decision.

He said: “There were no injury problems whatsoever, it was the decision to play Pilkington at the back. Ed (Asafu-Adjaye) has recovered fully from the injury problems that he’s had in the first part of the season and looks like he’s coming into a bit or form.

“I don’t think we need two defenders on the bench so it was a straight selection choice.”

Going into their game in hand, Hatters are eight points behind leaders AFC Wimbledon, but victory could see them climb above Newport County and into third in the table.

Rovers on the other hand have won just once away from home, a 4-3 success at Hayes & Yeading, while they have gone five without a triumph on their travels.

Money added: “This is our game in hand and we’re well aware that we need to make it count.

“We’ve got this game in very quickly because we didn’t want to fall behind as the weather can turn from here on in and you can lose matches at any time.

“They’ve (Rovers) have had some decent results and we know they will come here tomorrow night and enjoy themselves because everybody does.

“It’s a big atmosphere, a big stadium and it’s the big game, so we know what we have to do.

“I think we’re playing pretty well at the minute and hopefully we can continue that tomorrow.”

Although Town have slipped from the summit in recent weeks after a difficult set of fixtures, Money insisted he was more than happy with the path they are currently on.

He added: “We felt if we could get 30 points from first 15 games it would put us in contention.

“We’re three adrift of that which is not a disaster but we need to catch those three points up very quickly. The next 15 games we need to stamp our mark on this division and go on the type of run that we did at the end of last season.

“We always knew we would have a difficult start, but we’ve come through the period pretty well.

“I’ll take nine points from each set of four games from here on, I think that would put us pretty close.

“If you look at this stage last season it was Oxford who were in the same position that Wimbledon are, and then the charge came from behind. So we’ve got to make sure we are the team making that charge or at least keeping up with the charge.

“There are clear benchmarks in terms of the number of points that you need to win any league and we know exactly what they are. We’ll set benchmarks along the way to make sure we stay in contention and eventually finish where are.”

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