Sweet confirms Edwards never offered to resign as Luton board were desperate to back their manager
Four straight defeats meant Luton’s board had to take action
Hatters chief executive Gary Sweet stated that former manager Rob Edwards never once offered his resignation to the club despite the run of poor results this season, admitting the board were desperate for him to succeed at Kenilworth Road.
A tough season for Luton following relegation from their Premier League, particularly on the road, looked to have come to a head when they were thrashed 5-1 at Middlesbrough back in November, the result coming just before the international break. It led to many thinking that Edwards, who was also reported by some sections of social media to have left his role after the 2-0 loss to Sheffield United a month beforehand, that proving just rumours, would leave the club then, as he appeared to wave goodbye to supporters at the Riverside.
That wasn’t the case though, as he remained in charge, going on to lead Town to a 1-0 victory over Hull City when the campaign resumed. Unfortunately, that didn’t lead to a dramatic change in results, the Hatters winning just twice in their next 10 fixtures, losing their last 10 games on the road, while four straight defeats over the Christmas and New Year period, saw the board take a decision they didn’t want to, and part company with the popular manager on Thursday.
Speaking to the press this afternoon, Sweet discussed just how much they wanted to keep Edwards at the helm, saying: “There’s been a lot of talk about that Middlesbrough game and I can just maybe take the opportunity to clarify one or two things. Not once did Rob ever try to quit or resign or anything, let’s clear that one up, he’s not a quitter. Even when he was feeling low, he’s not a quitter and that’s the true testament of the sporting characteristic that he’s got, that desire to win.
"So after the Middlesbrough game there was no real thought that we would sever ties then and I know there’s lots of supporters that get frustrated by that, but that’s who we are and we stand by our people. We help and support them and we’ve got to recognise that some individuals will go through patches of whether it’s just poor form, bad luck, or challenges in life that might affect their performance, or a bit of all of that, but we give them the opportunity to recover from that and we did that.
"I actually think there was a period of time where we really thought that was going to happen, perhaps after Derby (2-1 victory), things were looking quite good. These last four games just made it very difficult for us and all of a sudden we’ve come back down into that relegation zone and that’s probably forced our hand a little bit.”
Although Luton found themselves struggling at the wrong end of the table, the board still wanted to keep their manager, but ultimately those four straight defeats to Bristol City, Swansea, Norwich and QPR, which saw Town drop to 20th, just two points off the bottom three, gave them very little option to take what was a highly emotional decision. Asked how the chat went, Sweet continued: “Good, it was very reasonable, and I think that term mutual was spot on.
“The last time I saw him we were hugging yesterday, it was quite unique, but it was a very, very sad conversation, very sad, it brought tears to our eyes. It was emotional and I don't want to quit either by the way. We talk about Rob not being a quitter, I didn't want to quit on him, the board didn't want to quit on him, we wanted to back him as much as we possibly can.
"It’s just that we got to that time where the culmination of things, we’re in that relegation zone, we hadn't won for the last four games and we’re just about in time in the January window to do something. We want to be active in the January window and we want a manager who is going to manage us for the rest of the season to be involved in that, so it was about the right time.”