No added pressure but Bloomfield demands to see Luton's 'edge' during crucial Argyle clash

​Luton boss Matt Bloomfield has demanded his side to play with the same ‘edge’ that he witnessed during Saturday’s defeat to Sheffield United when they come up against fellow relegation rivals Plymouth Argyle at Kenilworth Road this evening.

The Hatters go into the contest sitting at the bottom of the Championship after suffering their eighth loss in 10 second tier matches when beaten 1-0 by the Blades at the weekend. Although ending up empty-handed once more, the supporters who were present witnessed a far better performance from their side, who but for a number of missed chances, would have been celebrating a first win since late December.

They now have to make sure the same kind of display is produced when the Pilgrims are in town tonight, as Bloomfield said: “We had a good edge about us and we have to get that edge again on Wednesday evening. We can’t leave it at the first half and then hard luck stories, it’s about coming and winning games. It’s going ‘which bits went well for us?’ Reiterating those and going after them again and improving on the bits that we need to go after as well as every performance has positives and negatives.”

Although the 90 minutes will be huge for both side’s survival hopes, as Town could either close the gap to those ahead of them with a victory, or start to find themselves getting cut adrift with defeat, Bloomfield wasn’t about to start ramping up the pressure for his players. He continued: “I think every game is really important to us. I've never played in a football game that isn't important, they're all important and we have to approach it that we want to win the game. I've never played in a game as a player or never sent a team out as a manager who didn't want to win.

"I want to win, of course we do, but we have to be calm and we have to approach the fixture like everyone is important to win. Of course we're looking forward to the game and we want to replicate the performance from Saturday and look to improve. I also don't believe that adding pressure to the situation will help the players. They understand where we are, we all understand where we are. We have to approach the game with the edge that we had on Saturday, but also with the calm mind for the performance.”

After producing what was easily their best display since a change at the helm at the weekend, with the home fans responding positively following the final whistle, it led Bloomfield to feel like things are starting to shift for his side. Ahead of experiencing the magic of a night game at Kenilworth Road for the first time as manager, he said: “It feels like off the back of Saturday, even though the result didn’t go our way, off the back of the performance, I feel like there’s a bit of momentum within the crowd, within our supporters and within the group. It’s been bubbly the last couple of days and we want that to reflect again.

“I’m really excited, really looking forward to it. I’ve spoken a lot about the atmosphere and our football club, our supporters. There’s no doubt in my mind they saw the performance on the pitch because they reacted accordingly and it’s up to us to put another performance out there for them. They pay their hard earned money to follow us up and down the country, they haven’t had a huge amount to cheer recently and we have to make sure that we give them more to cheer.”

Town face a Plymouth side who also opted to change managers recently, with Wayne Rooney leaving after a desperately disappointing season and Miron Muslic being appointed as his replacement in January. Up until Saturday’s 2-0 defeat at Blackburn Rovers, the Bosnian had been enjoying the kind of new manager bounce that Bloomfield has been desperate for, as after drawing 2-2 at Sunderland, picked up three successive wins in all competitions, including knocking Premier League giants Liverpool out of the FA Cup, and thrashing Millwall 5-1 at Home Park to leapfrog Luton and climb off the bottom of the table.

They are yet to win away from Devon all campaign though, taking just four points from a possible 48 and could be without Ryan Hardie, who has netted five goals in his last four appearances. On the challenge ahead, Bloomfield added: “They’re really solid defensively, a really solid back-line. They’ve had some good results and carry a threat, won a lot of games but obviously a disappointing result for them on Saturday away from home.

"We understand and respect that they've had a big improvement over the last little while, so it’s going to be a tough game for us. Every game at this level for us is, but if we can implement ourselves on the game, we showed on Saturday against top quality opposition that we can really impose ourselves. They’ve got other threats in the squad, they’ve got players that are either new to the league or have been there and done it before at the level. So they have got some good players in their squad, we understand that, but it’s about trying to impose ourselves on the game.”