Wilshere happy to see Luton's players take their frustrations out on Tractor Boys U21s

Hatters boss Jack Wilshere was pleased that some of his players were able to let some of their pent-up frustrations out during a 6-0 hammering of Ipswich Town U21s in the Jersey Mike’s Subs Trophy group stage contest this evening.

Having gone into the game on the back of a hugely annoying 1-0 home defeat to Bradford City on Saturday, the Hatters chief made six changes to his starting XI, as Kal Naismith, Joe Johnson, Jordan Clark, Gideon Kodua, Devante Cole and Zach Ioannides all came into the team, Cole having not begun a game all season, with Naismith sitting out the last few fixtures after losing his spot in the side, and Johnson dropped following the 2-1 defeat to Stevenage.

Keeping their places were James Shea, Mads Andersen, Jake Richards, Emilio Lawrence and Dan Gore, as they were far too strong for the visitors, Clark bagging the first hat-trick of his senior career, with Cole, Johnson and late substitute Dawid Gawel all scoring the first goals of their Town careers too.

Speaking afterwards, an impressed Wilshere said: “I thought the boys were really good. I thought their attitude and mentality to the game, how they applied themselves, I spoke about it yesterday, there was a lot of frustration in the room for a number of different reasons. Whether they played at the weekend and they’re disappointed with the result, or they haven’t played and they’re disappointed with that and that’s the perfect way to show that, to let your frustration out.

"They executed everything, I thought their intensity, against teams like Ipswich and under 21 teams, you have to be really switched on because they’re really brave, and they want to play. You can see that’s what they want to do, they try and drag you all over the place and you have to stay focused, you have to win your duels, then kill their spirit and then let them feel your intensity when you’re attacking, and we did that. I thought they (Ipswich) were good and I thought also our high press in the first half was really good, the distances, how they try and drag you out of areas and then play through you.

"You’ve got to be ready for that, you have to be ready for that, and they’re going to have some success with it as well. I thought they did in the first half, but when you have the ball you have to let them feel your intensity, let them feel the variation you have in attack. Eventually after we played through them a few times they started to sit off a little bit. Then we played in behind them really well and we scored some good goals.”