Luton chief believes he has found some 'frailties' which could see Town end Clarets' miserly run

Luton boss Matt Bloomfield insists his side can become only the fifth team to find the net Turf Moor this afternoon after identifying what he believes are some ‘frailties’ in an incredibly miserly Burnley side.

The Clarets’ quite unbelievable defensive solidity this term has seen Scott Parker’s men concede a mere 10 goals from 35 matches, which included one at Kenilworth Road during their first match of the campaign. England U21 keeper James Trafford has managed 24 clean sheets since then, 12 of those coming at home, where they are unbeaten, having been breached just four times in 17 games, not since Kwadwo Baah found the net for Watford some six games and just over nine hours ago.

With Luton the lowest scorers in the division and only managing 12 in 17 outings on their travels, most Town fans will be making the trip in blind hope more than expectation, but although understanding the size of task ahead, discussing the Clarets, a positive Bloomfield said: “They’ve been incredible. They’ve obviously got a top goalkeeper, a really good team, well drilled. Scott knows the level, he’s been around it, got promotions, they’ve recruited some real good players.

"They’re fit, they know their discipline, they know the structure of their team, they know their shape really, really well but as with every team, every team has frailties. They don’t have too many but they have frailties. They have positives and they have negatives, so we’ll be looking forward to trying to exploit them. No-one’s perfect, they’re very, very good, but we’ve been working on what we believe we can implement ourselves and that’s believing in ourselves.

"You have to be aware of your opposition and plan for them tactically, but also you have to believe in what you’re doing and implement what you’re trying to do and impose yourselves on the game. It’s about getting that balance right, not being obsessed with Burnley and what they do well and what they do not so well, but getting the balance of us and believing in us. We know we’ve got some good players and we want to take the shackles off and start creating and scoring more. The lads have been working extremely hard on our defensive shape and we have to make sure that’s right first and foremost.

“They’ve got some really good players, (Josh) Cullen’s a good player, (Josh) Brownhill’s a good player, they’re top for the level. We understand that, but we believe in our group. We believe that we’ve got some very good players as well, so we’ve been working tactically this week and we’ve got a plan in place and we’ll hopefully implement that.”

Despite Bloomfield’s upbeat tone, he was well aware that most outside of Kenilworth Road will be anticipating yet another defeat for Luton’s horrific away form which as seen them take just one point out of possible 42. Since taking over, he hasn’t been able to arrest those troubles, with two defeats from three, although he was responsible for ending the lengthy losing run with a 1-1 draw at Sheffield Wednesday last month.

He said: “Any league in the country where the team who is up the top of the league are at home against the team who aren’t at the top of the league are away, it’s your football senses that says home win. But we believe in what we’re building. We’ve had moments away from home that have let us down. The Sunderland performance wasn’t good enough but apart from that it’s been moments and we need to turn those moments in our favour.

"We’ve done that at home recently and we’ve seen the Sheffield United game, the Plymouth game and the Portsmouth game that we’re able to compete and we believe we can do that away from home, but it’s up to us to and put that into practise. We want to change it (away record) we believe we can change it and we’re working towards changing it.

"Once you let the emotion of the Watford game die down, we gave away two goals that weren’t good enough, apart from that there was a lot to like. Sunderland we weren’t good enough, Sheffield Wednesday for 45 minutes didn’t have a shot on our goal, so there’s definitely been signs and we have to make those signs come to a reality because of where we are. We have to start putting points on the board, we did it on Saturday and we want to do more this week.”

Burnley did finally start to show some chinks in their armour when beaten 3-0 by Preston North End in the FA Cup, and then also conceding against Cardiff City in midweek. Asked if that made it any easier for Luton or heightened the difficulty going into today’s contest, Bloomfield added: “It’s just the same as I think they’re presenting very similar in the last few games as they were before. If you look at other games where they’ve kept clean sheets, there’s been opportunities for opposition teams and in the last couple of games there’s been opportunities for opposition teams.

"Not lads because you don’t keep that kind of clean sheet record if you’re giving up loads and loads of chances, but opposition teams have had shots, they’ve had opportunities against them. They’ve got a goalkeeper who’s very good as well, some of the finishing against them at times could have been taken and in the last couple of games they’ve conceded, but we know that not too much has been different in their performance level from before. It’s about recognising that and trying to implement our game.”