Keane: Hatters must adapt

The 25-year-old utility man, who filled in at right-back on the night, felt Town’s inability to change to a different style of football to suit the conditions came back to bite them.

He said: “The top teams in this league, they all play football now.

“When you are used to playing a certain way every week, it’s very hard to change it just for one game and sometimes you need to be able to do that.

“But if you’re not able to change it around you are going to find it very hard to get wins as places like Barrow.

“It wasn’t the greatest game of football you’ll ever see but these are the kind of games you’ve got to try and get a 1-0 somehow and we weren’t able to do that.

“They got in our faces, didn’t allow us to play football. Conditions didn’t help but we’re not using that as an excuse. We just didn’t play well enough, simple as that.

“I can’t put my finger on it to be honest. It was very hard to play football and I think that frustrated us a lot.

“They are going to get in your faces which I think they did, we just weren’t able to get going.

“Maybe we should have done more in the first half to make better opportunities as we were on top.

“While you’re on top in these games, you’ve got to take your chances.

“You’ve got to make opportunities, and when you don’t it’s going bite you and that’s what happened to us.”

Whereas Luton struggled all evening, Keane felt the Bluebirds got their tactics spot on.

He said: “I could start running forward and as soon as one of their players got the ball they just booted it forward. You’ve got to get back and help your defence, you just can’t rush up the field.

“As soon as they win the ball they just bang it forward and they don’t even try to make a pass.

“It’s very hard for the full-backs to get forward because you’ve got to protect your centre-backs at the same time.”

While Keane admitted full-back isn’t his preferred choice, he was just happy to be back playing his first game since early January in what has been a stop-start season for the influential midfielder.

He added: “I’ve hated being injured. I think it’s the worst thing ever.

“I just love playing football games and even though we lost I was just happy to be out there playing again.

“It’s not my first choice of playing, I’d rather play centre mid or centre-back, but as long as they need someone to play there I am more than happy to fill in.

“I feel fit and ready to go. As far as I’m concerned I want to play every game and hopefully the manager will pick me.”

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