Luton defender Andersen has been the 'nicest gift' for Hatters boss

Defender Mads Andersen has been described as the ‘nicest gift' for Hatters manager Matt Bloomfield this season.

The 27-year-old joined Luton in July 2023 when Town had just won promotion to the Premier League, but a succession of injuries meant he had made a mere 19 appearances in two years and only 11 from the start. It looked like his frustrating career in Bedfordshire could be coming to an end having been used just five times by Bloomfield when he took over in January, although not featuring since the 2-0 defeat against Watford in late February, the Hatters chief also speaking of putting together a more ‘robust' squad to try and win promotion back to the Championship.

However, the Danish centre half managed to get himself fit over the summer, and started pre-season in excellent form, one of the stand-out performers in training for the Luton boss, who stated he was back to the kind of player that had risen to such prominence at Barnsley, named in the League One Team of the Year. With Mark McGuinness out due to a virus and Teden Mengi injured, it has seen Andersen start both of Town’s third tier fixtures, with the Hatters yet to concede a goal, as the defender also opened his account with a diving header in the 2-0 win over Peterborough United on Saturday too.​

Discussing the centre half, Bloomfield said: “Mads has been the nicest gift in pre-season shall we say after his injury-hit couple of seasons that he’s had at the club. From day one he’s been absolutely excellent, both in terms of his training, he’s barely missed a session and his performances in that position in the team have been excellent. I really hope for him and for us that he retains that level of performance, because he’s been absolutely excellent from day one in pre-season.”

With Andersen, Kal Naismith and Christ Makosso giving Town a real aerial advantage at the Weston Homes Stadium, it was something Bloomfield wanted to use to their advantage on the day, as he continued: “We felt that we had the edge in terms of physicality and we wanted to implement that in the game. It was a great header and Mads is someone who can attack the ball in the opposition’s box as well as our own.

"We are quite a physically imposing team, especially by the end of the game, once you’ve got Nige (Nigel Lonwijk) on and you’ve got Macca (Mark McGuinness) on as well. It’s never going to be a straightforward way, one way of winning games. There’s going to be lots of ways we have to try and find to put points on the board and that came off.”

Fellow centre half McGuinness, who will be going up against Andersen for a place in Luton’s back three this term when everyone is fit and available, was happy to see his team-mate having turned things around at Kenilworth Road, adding: “He’s been excellent, I’m really happy for him. Obviously its been a difficult time here with injuries, but he’s such a great human, a great trainer and he deserves it. He’s done really well, he got the goal as well, contributing, so it was a really nice moment. He’ll do really well and hopefully he can stay strong and get better and better for the team.”