Lawless speaks from experience as he urges Luton's players to 'fight' against the negativity
Hatters interim chief came in for criticism from Town fans supporters during his time as a player
Luton interim manager Alex Lawless has urged Town’s players to demonstrate the desire and unity that is needed to ‘fight’ against the negativity they are currently facing.
A run of four defeats from six games in all competitions and seven from their last 12, saw Luton plumb to a new depth on Tuesday night, as they were beaten, and deservedly so, 3-1 in the Vertu Trophy by a League Two Cambridge United side who made 10 changes for the group stage clash at the Abbey Stadium.
It saw the visiting players head over to yet another frustrated away end after the game, with almost 600 Luton supporters making up a crowd of around 1,800, as they initially voiced their disapproval once more, although it wasn’t anywhere near the kind of vociferous fury Town’s squad was met with when losing 2-0 at Stevenage on Saturday, or 3-1 against Lincoln City last month.
Lawless, who was in the dug-out after Matt Bloomfield was dismissed from his position just 24 hours earlier, is someone who knows all about receiving criticism from Hatters supporters, as it happened to him during the early stages of his career at Kenilworth Road as a player. However, the midfielder was able to eventually win them over, going on to be named Supporters Player of the Year award for the 2012-13 campaign in fact, also becoming an important part of the team that won promotion back to the Football League just 12 months later.
He went on to play 203 times in total for the Hatters, scoring 22 goals, including the winner when Luton, then in non-league, knocked Wolverhampton Wanderers out of the FA Cup in 2013, returning to Bedfordshire as assistant U18s coach recently, before taking charge himself and then being promoted to his current role as senior professional development coach.
Looking back to how he came through the tough times and discussing what the players need to do now to ensure they do the same, he said: “I was in that position myself before and every player, every club, every team will have gone through something like that. Right now that’s what it is for our team and this group. It’s something that people don’t want to deal with, for us it’s the last thing that we want to be in that position.
"We all know what ambitions we have and that’s not getting it. We’ve had some honest conversations with the lads and you’ve got to fight, you’ve got to fight for everything. You’ve got to fight against negativity that’s going to come your way, deserved or not, either one, it doesn’t matter, you’ve got to fight it off. You have to do it personally, straight away as a player.
"I feel like it’s something I can talk about, I feel like it’s something I had success at in certain moments, especially here, so I feel like I’ve got that understanding of that, but it’s a team sport and at the end of the day you’ve got to do it individually to then come together, which is the most important thing. That’s the critical part of this that everyone stays as a group and works hard as a team to fight for those better moments that players have felt before.”
Although it feels, understandably so, like the light at the end of the tunnel is some way off for Town fans at the moment, who only two years ago had just lost 1-0 at home to Tottenham Hotspur in the Premier League, as fast forward to the present day and they are sitting 11th in the third tier, with a home game against Mansfield Town next on the horizon. Lawless, who will no doubt be back in his original role with the club’s younger players when that comes about, is confident this feeling won’t last though.
He added: “Again, I can only use my own experience where there were moments where and I remember it when people said we would never get out of the Conference, this will never happen. It does feel like that and I’m sure that there’s probably that type of feeling that there’s around now. However, clearly from evidence in the past it doesn’t last forevera nd everybody will be doing everything possible to make sure that comes quicker rather than later."