Luton CEO confirms Hatters are prepared to take a manager from another club to replace Jones

Luton chief executive Gary Sweet has confirmed that the Hatters would have no issues in taking a manager from another club to replace Nathan Jones in the Kenilworth Road dug-out.

The last time Town did so was then appointing John Still from Dagenham & Redbridge back in February 2013, with Jones initially on the coaching staff at Brighton when he was first took over back in January 2016.

His successor Graeme Jones was then a free agent, having left West Bromwich Albion, with Jones also out of work following his dismissal from Stoke City ahead of his return in May 2020.

In fact you have to go back to 1995 for the last time Luton swooped for a manager who was already in employment, when Lennie Lawrence left Bradford City to agree to take charge of the club.

However, that could change with Town looking to bring in a new man, plus having received a decent compensation package from Southampton for Jones and his coaching team of Chris Cohen and Alan Sheehan.

Speaking this morning, Sweet said: “It’s a good time to take somebody out of a club, I’ll be honest, it’s happened to us.

“Now, we always look to do the right thing, but the wrong thing isn’t necessarily taking a manager out of another club, it’s actually how you do it and the timing.

“The timing isn’t bad at all, it gives people a month to replace.

“We’ve got a good healthy compensation package coming in, which more than enough compensates for any compensation package we’ve got that we might need to pay out of it’s another manager at another club.

“That’s still money, so if we have to pay somebody X amount then he’s got to be X amount better than somebody who isn't attached to a club.”

Although confirming the club will look at those currently in work, Sweet also stated they could be interested in those who are well respected coaches and yet to dip their toes into the management game.

He continued: “We're looking at all profiles and one of traditional routes is to look at good, strong, well educated coaches as well, who might not have too much experience in the game.

“We’re also looking at that profile as well, because it’s tried and tested, not just with us, a few people have copied the way we do things and got some success out of it.

“That’s not giving you an idea that we’re going down any particular route, but we’re looking at all three of those categories.

“The one category we’re probably not looking at is those managers that have got a lot of experience, have a certain way of doing things and maybe been around the block a little bit, that’s not our profile.

“We do want somebody who's a little bit more pliable and will work with the club.

“There’s not a lot to change here, the processes that we’ve got in place, that the club’s put in place, that Nathan followed, are all there, we don't see really those changing.

“The elements of recruitment, sports science, physiotherapy, all of those supporting facilities, services, that we would provide a manager, broadly won’t change, analytics as well.

“So we’re really looking for a manager and a coach, and that’s what managers generally like.

"They want to come into an environment that’s actually got good foundations, robust, got a good way of operating.

“They can come in and not really do an awful lot, other than integrate themselves into the playing squad and keep things ticking along for a little while until they can really suss things out and see how things go.

“Of course we want a little bit of change, we always do, but the whole thing doesn’t need breaking up and restructuring like it often does need to happen when a manager joins another club anyway.”

With Jones officially leaving the club on Thursday, when asked if there had been plenty of applications coming in for the vacancy, Sweet continued: “We won’t mention a number because this isn’t an ego project.

"This is just about the quality of candidates not the number.”

When Town last brought in an unknown quantity when it came to first team management in Graeme Jones back in September 2019, who had a real pedigree after being assistant at Swansea City, Wigan Athletic, Everton, Belgium coach and West Bromwich Albion, the gamble didn’t work out, Luton dropping into the Championship relegation zone.

They were only saved when Covid hit and a change at the helm was made, with Nathan Jones returning from his tough time at Stoke City, sacked after eight difficult months with the Potters.

On whether the club had gleaned anything from that, Sweet added: “There are things I learned differently that I will do today, that’s in my mentality and I think that is the mentality of all of us here.

“This isn’t about Graeme Jones. I’m telling you now, Graeme Jones is a great man, he is a fantastic coach and superb tactician.

“Sometimes things just don’t work out and I think what we need to do is to recognise from that, where perhaps that didn’t quite gel for us and understand how we can circumnavigate that prior to the appointment this time around.

“It’s not about that particular appointment, we can always go back and look at our mistakes, focus too much on our mistakes, rather than look at what the positive things are.

“Let's look at the appointment of Nathan Jones and the appointment of John Still. Where were we successful? How did we manage to attract those people? What was it about those individuals that attracted them to our football club and enabled them to integrate fully into what we do here and then lead us?

“They are the things we’re really focusing on, not the negatives.”