Safety first for Luton boss despite Town moving within three points of the Championship play-offs

Luton boss Nathan Jones wants to make sure his side are safe from relegation before getting carried away with any talk of a play-off push this season.

The Hatters’ 1-0 win at Swansea City last night saw them break the 40-point margin with 18 games of the season to go, and they are five points ahead of where they were at this stage last season.

The previous five years has seen an average of 46 points enough to stay up, which means barring an almighty collapse, Town are pretty much there.

If anything, Jones' men are looking the other way this year, as the victory in midweek means they are now three points off the top six and have a game in hand over West Bromwich Albion, as they could move above the dotted line with a victory over Barnsley at Kenilworth Road next Tuesday night.

However, the Town chief was talking a cautious view of proceedings, saying: "We’ve just got to keep getting points.

"Realistically, let’s not get carried away too early as the first thing we have to do is make sure we secure our status in this league.

"That's the first thing to do and that’s what we have to do, once we do that, then see where we can go.

"I don’t think you’re going down on 42 points, but that's our first thing achieved.

"Now we have 18 games to go, 18 massive games where we have to keep consistency, keep wins, try and get as many points as we can and see where it takes us.”

Success for Town this year would be anything above the 12th place they finished last season, or the tally of 62 points garnered.

It's hard not to think about a play-off race after a run of four wins in their last six matches, as Town have beaten Bournemouth, Reading, Bristol City and Swansea, drawing with Blackburn Rovers, only suffering one defeat, that at Sheffield United.

Jones, who climbed into the away end to celebrate with the travelling supporters after the full time whistle on Tuesday night, continued: "We are very close to the play-offs, we’re three points with a game in hand and what we’ve asked them to do is the four games we’ve had called off, Reading, Bristol City, Swansea and Coventry, we’ve won all three of those.

"So we’ve come back from the break in real good form and celebrating really because the fans were magnificent.

"They’ve travelled down here on a Tuesday night, massive journey, so just repay a bit of them.

"It was a massive, massive result to us because these are really difficult to play against.

"They can dominate possession, they can cause you real problems and if you’re not disciplined they’ll pick you off.

"But we were disciplined, aggressive, energetic, hungry, loved our performance."

Swansea is proving a good place for Jones too, having enjoyed three victories and two defeats now during his visits to Wales with both Luton and Stoke.

He added: "Ironically I didn't have many wins at Stoke, but I won here as well and it kept me in a job for another month.

"I love coming home, it’s great to see my family, come back to God's country and this is a difficult place to come.

"They’re not getting the results at the minute, but they’re such a difficult side to play again, they really are."