Sluga's character hailed by Bradley who felt Croatian could have gone under after tough start at Luton

Luton captain Sonny Bradley hailed the character of keeper Simon Sluga as he continues to bounce back from his tough start to life in England.

The 26-year-old Croatian had struggled at Kenilworth Road when arriving in England back in the summer, cutting an increasingly forlorn figure, none more so than when he made two big errors in the 2-0 defeat at Derby County, costing him his place in the team.

However, since returning to the side in December, he has improved week by week, keeping three clean sheets in his last six matches, including making a stunning stop during the 0-0 draw at Wigan Athletic on Saturday.

Bradley said: “I can’t hide from it, he did have a difficult start to the season, but so did a few of us, it’s not just Simon that struggled at the start of the season.

“I think a few of us struggled to pick up the pace of the league, but now he’s right up to speed.

“As we’ve seen, his kicking has come on and I know it’s something he’s worked on.

“His shot-stopping has always been really good and it’s just about the experience of the division.

“You’ve got to remember, he’s in a different country, he’s in one of the toughest leagues in the country, so he had a bit of a tough start, but it shows he’s got a great character.

“He could’ve easily, in the first 20 games, gone under but that’s not what Simon’s about.

"He’s worked even harder on his game, and he makes himself available for every game.”

Sluga’s wonderful stop at the weekend came from Michael Jacobs in stoppage time, showing magnificent reflexes to dive low to his left and claw the shot past the post, before celebrating animatedly afterwards.

Bradley, who was one of the first players over to congratulate the keeper, felt it was a stop worthy of the top flight, saying: “His save towards the end, his reactions, that’s Premier League stuff.

“It’s brilliant from Simon, but I’m saying all this and that’s his job. His job is to keep the ball out of the net, he’s done it today and I’m proud of him.

“It’s possibly better close up. I’ll watch it a few times because I don’t think there were too many outstanding highlights because it wasn’t that sort of game.

“From a personal level and from what I could see on the pitch, he was our best player, for me.

“His kicking was spot on and our chances that we were going to get from the game were coming from Simon and his kicking, that was really good.

“He got a round of applause, but we all had a round of applause between us, just for the level of performance.

"Simon Sluga came in late, I just thought he missed out on the applause, so it was let’s just give Simon one."

Bradley knows though that Sluga, who was called up for the Crotia squad yesterday, needs to maintain such a level of performance during the run-in.

He added: “Simon has been brilliant and in the last nine games we just need him to be consistent for the next nine.

"That’s everyone, to be fair, that’s the full squad, we need it to be consistent.

"Simon needs to be consistent and he needs to play like that from now until the end of the season, to give us the best chance of staying up.

“That, possibly, could be a really big point come the end of the season when you look at how tight it is at the bottom.”