Luton boss will meet up with some familiar faces at Robins

Hatters boss Nathan Jones could come up against a host of familar faces when Town travel to Swindon for the Checkatrade Trophy second round this evening.
Hatters boss Nathan JonesHatters boss Nathan Jones
Hatters boss Nathan Jones

The Robins’ head coach is Luke Williams, who was development coach at Brighton when Jones had a number of roles with the Seagulls.

Meanwhile, Swindon have a host of former Brighton players, incuding Yaser Kasim, who had a short loan spell with Luton in the 2012-13 season, plus forward Jonathan Obika, who Jones helped sign on loan from Spurs during his time with Yeovil, Charlton and Brighton.

He said: “They’ve got a lot of players that I know there, a Brighton connection because of Luke, Brad Barry’s there, Anton Rodgers is there, Kasim, some real good footballers.

“John (Obika) I’ve pretty much recommended at every club I’ve been at to be honest with you.

“At Yeovil we took him, I recommended him to Charlton, we took him to Charlton and took him to Brighton, so they’ve got some big threats.

“I know a lot of the players and it’s a good football club and it will be a very, very difficult test.”

Williams has been joined at the County Ground by former Spurs and Aston Villa boss Tim Sherwood, who was appointed as director of football last month.

He did head into the dug out for the game against Charlton recently tooh, but when asked if he had spoken to Williams about his role at the club since the arrival of Sherwood, Jones continued: “No, and it’s none of my business.

“Luke’s a fantastic coach, it probably suits him a little bit more having someone who takes the pressure and Luke can do what he’s very, very good at, which is coaching a football team.

“I don’t know what the situation there is with Tim, so I’m not going to comment on it, but obviously Tim’s a very experienced guy.

“He’s been brought in for a reason and I’m sure he’ll have an impact, a positive one.”

On the challenge of Swindon, who are 18th in League One this term, and qualified for this stage of the Trophy by topping a group containing Oxford, Exeter and Chelsea U23s, winning one and drawing too, Jones said: “It will be very stern test.

“One they’re a League One side anyway, so that ups the ante if you like. They’re a good side, they were a very expansive side, changed slightly now, but they’ll be a real stern test.

“I’m sure that they’ll want to win the game having gone out of the FA Cup, so they’ll want to go forward in this cup.

“We all want to win games when we play them, but we can’t second guess what Swindon are going to do and just got to make sure we’re ready.

“We all take this competition seriously too. We’ve done our work which is an extension of the work we do every day, so as long as we’re ready that’s all I’m concerned about.”

Meanwhile, on the tie, striker Jack Marriott aded: “The lads that have played have been really, really good.

“It shows that we’ve got a good crop coming through. Young Akin (Famewo) has played, Frankie (Musonda), Zane (Banton),…you forget that JJ’s (James Justin) that old and he’s been a regular in the first team recently.

“They’ve all got fabulous attitudes, they’re all very good footballers and it bodes well for the future of Luton Town.”