Ogbene felt Luton struggled to cope with the amount of respect shown by relegation rivals

Luton attacker Chiedozie Ogbene felt his side struggled to cope with the amount of respect shown by Sheffield United during their disappointing 3-1 defeat to the Premier League’s basement side on Saturday.

The Hatters had been universally backed in what was an unusual position as favourites going into the fixture, on the back of a run of three wins and two draws from their last six top flight outings, plus scoring four in their previous two games against Brighton & Hove Albion and Newcastle United. It meant confidence around the camp and in the stands had been soaring ahead of kick-off, but unfortunately that didn’t translate on to the pitch, as although Town dominated possession, with a season’s high 75 percent of the ball, they failed to do much with it.

Carlton Morris scored from the penalty spot early in the second half to make it 2-1, but bar another shot from the forward that was palmed aside by Wes Foderingham, who also smothered an effort from Elijah Adebayo and watched Tahith Chong’s curler fly inches wide, the United keeper didn’t have a great deal to do. Eager to look for the positives from the display though, Ogbene felt it was a good learning curve for the Hatters when coming up against a side looking to let Luton have the majority of the ball in the future, especially if they can keep their heads above water this campaign.

He said: “Funny enough, at the start of the season we weren’t thinking that (being favourites). But I think it’s good for us to learn from this because if we stay in this division, the newly promoted teams will probably do this to us and we need to know how to break it down. Or if we start winning games, teams might fear us and they might try to hold a low block, so we still need to play with intensity. Even though they let you have the ball, you have to do something with the ball and not just keep it as that’s the first time we got the kind of respect or this kind of time on the ball. We’re not used to it, we just need to pick it up again

“It’s good as when we look at the clips, now can start picking moments where we could maybe be a threat. Now we can watch it again and say if this happens again, this is what we can do differently, because I believe there will be teams who come here and try to upset us. So I’m happy it happened now rather than later on in the season when we need to win games and don’t know what to do. Now we know what teams can do to us here, we just need to find ways to break it down, break it down with tempo, and that’s what I think we lacked, tempo.”

Ogbene, who was starting his fourth successive top flight game in the right wingback slot despite Issa Kabore being available after his time at the Africa Cup of Nations with Burkina Faso came to an end, pinpointed his side’s lack of intensity as the main reason behind the defeat. Summing up why he felt Luton were so below par, Ogbene said: “Honestly, I just think we started too slow, not enough pressure and maybe just playing into their hands. I think the intent was there, but just the intensity, the intensity wasn’t good enough in the first half. Maybe we just played within ourselves, as there wasn’t enough pressure, maybe we thought it would be easier than what it was and I think that was what ultimately came down to the result.

“We play high intensity football, it’s difficult to play that when they’re in a low block. Naturally you want to play fast, but when they’re like that, you can’t really force stuff and go in behind them as there’s no space to go in behind. Even though we were patient, maybe we were just too patient. I think sometimes we could have taken some risks into the strikers and maybe just risked a bit more, but when they’re set up like that it’s difficult as if you start rushing and forcing things, you’re playing into their hands. You have to be patient, but I think we were too patient and we were playing too slow, we just needed to raise the tempo.

“I wouldn’t say we were off it, maybe with the time we had on the ball, we weren’t effective with it. We were still trying to do the right things, but maybe too slow, that was it really. I feel like we did the right things last week (against Newcastle) and they came off, and today it didn't come off. The tempo wasn’t there, but teams set up differently and we can’t play the same way every week. It’s different styles, so you have to find ways to break them down and maybe we just took our time trying to find a way and the next thing you know you’re 2-0 down, so it’s devastating."

After getting it back to 2-1 with seven minutes of the second period gone, and having the momentum with them for the first time in the match, Luton couldn't do a great deal with it, going on to concede a third with 18 minutes to go, Vini Souza left unmarked to slam beyond Thomas Kaminski. Ogbene added: “Alfie (Doughty) had a chance to flash it across and it's just bobbled up I believe. If we score that, 2-2, that’s the margins, that’s how tight it is in the league. You miss that chance, they go down and score, 3-1, it becomes a more difficult battle.”