Lockyer thanks Town's away supporters for not turning on their players after dismal showing at Blundell Park

Luton defender Tom Lockyer thanked Town’s travelling supporters for not turning on their player after last night’s embarrassing 3-0 FA Cup exit at the hands of League Two Grimsby Town.

An opening 45 minute blitz from the fired up Mariners saw Hatters’ poor defending taken full advantage of, the hosts running a three goal lead that they never looked like giving up.

With just under 500 fans making the trip to Blundell Park on a cold Tuesday night, the majority of them stayed until full time, giving Lockyer and the rest of his team-mates a decent ovation after the whistle.

It was something manager Rob Edwards appreciated as did his skipper for the night, who said: “I’m massively disappointed, it’s not how we wanted to bow out of the cup by any means.

“The damage was done in the first half where we just didn’t do the basics and when you come to a place like this the last thing you want to do is give them an early first goal and let the crowd get right behind them like they did.

“We weren’t hungry enough in the first half and it shows that if we come off our standards even slightly we’ll get punished.

“It hurts and it’s a learning curve for us and in a way I’m kind of glad it’s happened in the cup and not in a league game, but when we went over to the fans at the end, it could have been easy for them to be effing and blinding at us when we’ve just lost 3-0 to a League Two side, and they weren’t.

“They were right behind us, they were singing and fair play to the ones that travelled and stayed right to the end, even though we were losing 3-0, that shows the togetherness here we’ve built with the fans.

“It’s going to be massive moving forward now, full focus on the league and it could have been easy for them to turn on us at the end, but hopefully they can see the bigger picture.

“If they had turned on us, they’d be in their right mind to do so, so hopefully they can see the bigger picture and I think they do see that, what we’re building.

“When you look at success it’s not plain sailing, there’s going to be bumps in the road and we’re all trying to be successful here, we’re all trying to win every game we play in.

“It wasn’t the case today and Grimsby are no pushovers, especially when we come here and when we give them that first goal it was always going to be hard, going to be uphill and when the crowd was right behind them.”

Although Town improved when kicking towards their own fans, Cauley Woodrow’s header saved by the impressive Max Crocombe, who also denied Jordan Clark, with Woodrow, Pelly-Ruddock Mpanzu and Gabe Osho off target too, Lockyer knew they had to break through in the opening stages to try and make a game of it.

He added: “If we had got an early goal second half it could have been different but we never.

"We didn’t do enough, shot ourselves in the foot first half.

"We were second to everything, they were hungrier for it than us and if we drop our standards even a little bit we’ll get punished, so a disappointing night.”