Luton chief backs struggling Hull to find their feet in the Championship

Town boss Nathan Jones is convinced that today’s opponents Hull City will soon adjust to life in the Championship after what has been a tough start to the campaign.

The Tigers were promoted back into the second tier after just one year away, winning the League One title last term, pipping Peterborough to top spot.

Grant McCann’s side were hoping to make a better first of their last efforts at this level, when they finished bottom of the pile in 2019-20, and they made a fine start to those ambitions, winning 4-1 at Preston North End on the opening day.

However since then, the Tigers have struggled badly, losing eight of their next 12, going through six games without scoring as well, a home defeat to fellow newboys Peterborough United increasing the pressure on McCann.

It means that going into this afternoon's contest at Kenilworth Road, Hull are third bottom, as Jones said: “I’m sure they’ll find their feet.

"You look at Wycombe last year, Wycombe were written off and should have stayed up, but they'll find their feet.

"What we’ve just got to do is concentrate on us, make sure we’re the best version of us, because we can't put in a performance like that (at Derby) and expect to win games.

"We’ve got a home game now where we’d like to get points, as we’ve had a decent start to the month so far in terms of we’re unbeaten in four now, two wins, two draws, so at Championship level that’s wonderful, it really is.

"We have to continue that, it’s a different test again from Derby and that’s what we have to prepare for.”

One player that the Tigers have in their ranks is former Luton midfielder George Moncur, who spent over two years at Town, scoring 11 goals in 59 outings, including some truly memorable strikes against Fleetwood, Portsmouth and Wigan.

Jones continued: “We know George, but I know quite a lot of them and it’s not a question of George Moncur, it’s about us being us.

"We’ve got players that if they’re at it and do well then we’re a better team.”

Meanwhile, the Town boss was also happy to be back at home after back-to-back away games, the third time this term that Luton have played two matches on the road in the space of four days.

Speaking at Pride Park following a 2-2 draw with Derby that came on the back of Saturday's 1-0 win at Millwall, he blasted: "Whoever made this rule up is a clown.

"You’ve got to play two away games, so they’ve (Derby) had two home games, they’re going to be fresher than us.

"We’ve had to travel, twice, away from home, you can’t prep, whoever made it up needs a real good clip in my opinion.

"But we’ve got two home games (coming up), and it’s a ridiculous rule it really is, it’s stupidity, what happened to home and away?

"That’s sometimes where you lack energy and the way we play, sometimes we’ll have to change the way we play.

"I could have had made changes tonight but it was such a good performance on the weekend I felt we could go and do it again."