Luton chief wants his Hatters side to start creating better chances
Town fail to score from open play during 2-2 draw with Port Vale
Hatters boss Jack Wilshere wants his side to step up their attacking efforts and begin to create better chances in front of goal as they struggled to score from open play against once more at the weekend.
Although Luton netted in truly wonderful fashion in the first half against Port Vale on Saturday, Cohen Bramall whipping a quite magnificent free kick into the top corner, they fell 2-1 behind early in the second period and required a corner to earn a point, Mads Andersen heading in Liam Walsh’s delivery for his second goal of the campaign.
On Tuesday night, it was Walsh’s set-piece once more that saw Town draw level, Gideon Kodua stooping to head into the net in stoppage time, as you have to go back to the 1-1 draw with Bolton Wanderers last month for the last time Town scored from open play in the league, Gideon Kodua firing in from a Shayden Morris cross that rebounded to him from Milli Alli’s touch.
Even during the 2-1 win over Huddersfield, it began with Jake Richards cracking a deflected strike into the net from 22 yards that came as part of a second phase from a corner, before Jerry Yates tapped in on the line after Lamine Fanne’s shot was heading in. Before that, the Hatters had gone two games without scoring, as it took the 3-0 win at Stockport County on November 8, some six games ago for Town to really look fluent in open play, Richards and Izzy Jones netting after excellent team moves.
On how he feels they can go about solving their current problems in front of goal, Luton having scored just 10 times in Wilshere’s nine third tier matches in charge, he said: “I think we need to create more and better chances. I felt that we were the team that were searching for it, the context of the game obviously they were happy with a point and we wanted to win the game, but we need to create better moments in open play throughout the whole game.
"We did at times in the first half, but we need to be more consistent. I think we can attack the space in the box better, when we get wide and put the ball into the box. First of all we have to have quality, which we do, we do, but it has to be more consistent.”
Part of the problem is the lack of goals from Town’s strikers this term, as three forwards have been given a chance in the number nine spot, but so far, under the new boss, just Jerry Yates has found the net in the league, that from a matter of inches too. Nahki Wells is without a goal, as is the fit-again Jacob Brown, who was given his opportunity against the Valiants on Saturday, while Lasse Nordas has only been sparingly from the bench, Elijah Adebayo and Ali Al-Hamadi both still out absent as they recover from injuries.
At the weekend, an ineffective Brown, who won just one of his 18 aerial duels, had an hour, before being replaced by Wells for the final stages, the substitute limited to just six touches of the ball during his time on the pitch. With Yates left out completely having started the last three league games, but failing to impress in the 1-1 draw with Orient, then asked about settling on a first choice striker, Wilshere continued: “Yates played the other day and Nahki was back. I said it the other day and before, loads of times, Milli (Alli) was out of the squad on Tuesday, Milli comes and plays, so there’s nothing in it apart from Nahki came back.
"We felt like Nahki was going to come on for Browny on 60 minutes and then if we need something else it might be a little bit different to what we’ve got, which is Lasse, so we’ll look at that again for Reading, but it was just no space on the bench again. You think about building relationships with a striker, a winger, midfielder, winger, what type of pass he likes. You put the ball out wide, what’s that winger going to do?
"Is he going to get at his man? Is he going to get it out of his feet and cross it early? So we need to keep working on it, keep trying to build those connections and those relationships and I felt up to the last two games we’ve created some nice moments and have been getting into the final third a lot. The last two games we haven’t and we have to look at and I think it’s more of a belief thing.”
Having restored Alli to the starting line-up at the weekend, his first league start since Wilshere’s opening game in charge against Mansfield back in October, the former Exeter attacker was then taken off at half time, with Shayden Morris preferred for the second period. On the decision, the boss added: “I just wanted to change it up a little bit. I felt like we probably weren’t getting the joy down that side that we wanted, and I also think sometimes it’s interesting if you change the winger at half time. A full back goes in thinking, ‘I’m winning the battle with the winger,’ and then changing it up can help, and I thought it did a little bit.”