Luton chief remains convinced Town have enough to remain a Premier League club

Luton boss Rob Edwards remains convinced that his side have enough to remain in the Premier League this season despite letting another chance to climb out of the bottom three slip away at Wolverhampton Wanderers yesterday.

The Hatters headed to Molineux to face a home side on a winless run of six games in the top flight, only scoring four goals in that time, and having been beaten 1-0 on home soil by AFC Bournemouth in midweek. Unfortunately for the visitors, Gary O’Neil’s starting XI was boosted by the return of midfield duo Matheus Cunha and Boubacar Traore, the pair costing around £55m, as they looked to move into the top half of the table themselves.

An even first period saw Wolves eventually go in front when moments after Carlton Morris put a header too close to Jose Sa, they flooded forward, Cunha finding Hwang Hee-chan who found the net via a cruel deflection off Teden Mengi. Immediately after the break, Daiki Hashioka lost his man from a short corner routine which allowed Toti a free header from close range to double the scores, as although Morris pulled one back with 10 minutes left, it wasn’t enough for a grandstand finish.

Luton’s position, although precarious, could still be in their own hands, as they remained a point behind Nottingham Forest, who host in-form title-challengers Manchester City this afternoon. The Hatters entertain an already safe Everton next Friday night, then go to West Ham and welcome Fulham to Kenilworth Road on the final day, with the Reds going to Sheffield United next weekend before hosting a Chelsea team capable of producing anything on their current form.

Forest end their campaign at Burnley, the Clarets themselves now in with a real shout of staying up too, one point behind Luton after drawing 1-1 at Manchester United yesterday, to make it just one defeat in their last eight matches.

However, asked about his own side’s chances of beating the drop based on yesterday’s evidence, Edwards said: “What I saw is a team that is committed and tried to do the right things. We clearly made some mistakes, a free header in the box is the biggest one that we made, and we have said the same kinds of things a lot this season, where we’ve been close, but we’ve come away with nothing ultimately.

"But I’ve seen enough over the course of this season and especially with some of the players, Eli (Elijah Adebayo) coming back as well, that we can cause teams problems, especially at home. So I believe that we can and the players do as well, as if they didn’t, they’d have shown that in their performance. At two-nil down, it would have become even more comfortable for Wolves, we got the last goal, we kept going and had the last shot on target right towards the end.

"There wasn’t loads in the game today, Wolves have got some good players, they’ve had a really good season. I know they’ve had a bit of a difficult run, they were always going to respond after Wednesday night and the performance as well, so I think we came up against them at the wrong time off the back of a performance they’ll be slightly disappointed with. They had one or two bodies coming back as well which helps them, but there’s enough there, we’ve got enough there.”

Having gone into the game on the back of a dreadful 5-1 defeat to Brentford on home soil, Edwards had been more than pleased with the way his side got that display out of their system in the early stages, beginning strongly as they went close through Ross Barkley early on and also had some real moments of danger before Wolves broke the deadlock.

The boss continued: “We started the game well, we were good, we took the ball, we were a threat. We probably wanted to arrive with a few more numbers, be a bit snappier in the final third, but it was pretty good. We had a good effort on target, it was a comfortable save and we know what spaces we give away. I thought we dealt with that long ball, it ended up in our box and a deflected goal, but we started the game well, we showed some good stuff with the ball and without it as well.

"I thought we were pretty solid, clearly then we had to open up. We made some changes, Chongy (Tahith Chong) at left wingback, Wolves had one or two moments, but I think if you look at the game with your eyes, even with the stats, there’s not loads in the game. In terms of an away performance and especially how we were last week, there’s a lot of good stuff there to take into the final three games.”

The manner in which Wolves took the lead saw yet another deflected strike end up in the back of the Hatters’ net, continuing their misfortune when trying to keep the ball out, conceding an own goal and seeing Son Heung-min’s effort deviate off Hashioka at Spurs for a late winner, before the Japanese international also unluckily diverted in Erling Haaland’s wayward volley during the recent 5-1 defeat to Manchester City as well.

Edwards wasn’t about to bemoan the bad luck though, adding: “We’ve had a few moments that have gone against us, but I think you have to earn that as well. If you don’t shoot you don’t score and they earned that. We don’t want it to get to that point in the first place, but it did. I’m not going to say things are going against us as I’m not that kind of guy, I look at what we can affect and what we can try and do. There’s some stuff there that I know we can really take forward into now two huge home games and an away trip to West Ham in between.

"We don’t know what we’re going to need, but the big message from me is we’re in this fight. We’ve seen a team that’s committed there, they didn’t go under at two-nil down away from home against a good Wolves team and I know Wolves have been on a tough run but they’ve had people missing as well. They start to get one or two back you can see the difference it makes, especially a couple of those players at the top end of the pitch. We kept going and we’ll take that into the final three games.”