Town chief jokes that Walsh's return could help turn Fanne into Luton's Frank Lampard

Luton boss Jack Wilshere has joked that the return of Liam Walsh could help free up Town team-mate Lamine Fanne to become the Hatters’ version of legendary goalscoring midfielder Frank Lampard.

The 27-year-old made his return from a shoulder injury suffered last month under previous boss Matt Bloomfield which saw him miss eight matches in total, Town losing five of them, while a run of three defeats from the first five saw Bloomfield pay the price with his job earlier this month. It meant Walsh was unable to immediately impress Town’s new manager when he was appointed, but having resumed training recently, he was back in the starting line-up for Tuesday evening’s 3-1 Vertu Trophy success over Brighton & Hove Albion U21s at Kenilworth Road.

The former Everton youngster got just over an hour on the night before being replaced, and with the way he handles possession of the ball, coupled with his ability to knit passes together and his desire to win it back from the opposition, Wilshere feels that if selected, it will only help give license to those around him, like Fanne, who opened his account in Saturday’s 1-0 win at Northampton Town, to venture that bit further forward.

In fact, it might even allow the Spaniard to really make a name for himself too, as the Town chief said: “You can see probably from the way we’ve been playing, we’ve put Lamine down next to Sav (George Saville) to try and get a little bit more control in games, number one with the ball, so if we lose the ball we’ve got men there who can counter press. In my opinion, the more players you have lower in the build-up, the more chance you have of being successful in that phase, so we tried to do that and Liam gives us something a little bit different.

"Lamine is someone who’s probably not quite the same player as Liam is on the ball but he gives you something different, he runs forward, he’s got power and pace, so bringing Liam back probably frees up Lamine a little bit higher up the pitch. I think that’s something we can work with and I’ve been joking with him (Fanne) this week that we’re going to turn him into Frank Lampard, who scored loads of goals, so he’s exciting and it’s really good to have Liam back.

“We had to stop him, he wanted to play last week, but it’s good to have him back. He’s a player that I’ve seen over the years, plays, tidy, clean, he can help keep the ball for us. He puts his foot in, he tries to win duels, he’s a leader, but he’s someone that is interesting for us and something that we’re definitely going to need.”