Still left purring over Town’s dynamic duo

Gray bagged his first hat-trick for Luton, his fifth goal in three games, while some of Benson’s hold up and link play had his manager purring.

Still said: “I thought the combination between Paul and Andre is first class.

“Every time Paul jumps, Andre’s looking for it. Paul is so clever, there was one bit of movement, it didn’t lead to a goal, the ball just fell slightly wrong side of Andre, but he’d pulled two centre halves with him and just dropped the ball into space, so I was really pleased with that combination.”

Despite the final scoreline, Hattesr didn’t have it all their own way though as after leading 1-0 on 15 minutes, the visitors came back into the clash and were the better sides for periods.

They levelled with an own goal from Steve McNulty, before a half time alteration saw Luton start the second with real intent as an early double fropm Luke Guttridge and Gray enabled Town to instantly seize back the initiative.

Still continued: “We started great, but came up against a 3-5-2 which threw us out a little bit as we wanted to play narrow with Luke Guttridge.

“Every credit to them, they made the first half not what we would have particularly wanted and it was a case second half of adjusting and getting Luke to play in that left hand channel.

“He can do that, but I think he’s more effective when he’s coming off the line, but once we did that, I was really really pleased as we moved the ball a lot quicker which is really important when you play against three centre halves.

“Teams are going to come here and not going to make it easy for us, as they pushed their wing backs really far on and made the pitch nice and wide.

“We could have been two up or maybe three up before they got into the game, so we had to have a little tweak of it and to move the the ball quicker, once we made the pitch a little bit bigger, we were fine.”

On McNulty’s own goal, Still quipped: “He said he was due a goal, but to be fair, that was a great ball in, he’s got to head it and it’s gone in.

“That’s disappoiting to come in at 1-1, but drawing or being behind is not a problem to us, because we know we’re potent and strong going forward.

“We actually know we’re strong defensively too. We had a little blip for a couple of games, let’s hope that’s over.”

After a slow start in goal, Town have now netted 21 in their last seven games, and Still confirmed he was never in doubt their predatory instincts would shine through, adding: “I think I was asked the question seven or eight games ago was I worried we weren’t scoring goals?

“I said we’ll score goals because we’ve got people capable of scoring goals. One or two not quite as fit as we would like, one or two perhaps not in the best form as we would like, but they’ll get there.

“I knew we would score goals and we’re scoring goals, so long may it continue.”

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