Town legend Harford just happy to help out his beloved Hatters

Town interim manager Mick Harford was happy to help out in any way he could following the departure of Nathan Jones to Premier League side Southampton last week.

With the Welshman meeting the Saints following Luton’s 2-0 defeat at Stoke City on Tuesday night, accepting the offer to take over from Ralph Hasenhüttl and then officially unveiled on Thursday morning, Harford, who has carried out every job role going at Kenilworth Road, agreed to lead the Hatters into their Championship match with Rotherham on Saturday.

He received a tumultuous ovation from the full house at Kenilworth Road prior to kick-off and following the 1-1 draw, clearly emotional when speaking about the reception in his post match press conference.

When discussing why he offered to take on the role once more, as Harford had done so when Jones first left back in January 2019, although for a significantly longer period that time, winning the League One title and securing Luton’s return to the Championship, he said: “The game never changes, but managers leave, managers come and you get put in a position where you just try and help and that’s all my aim was.

"I said to Gary (Sweet, chief executive), whatever you need.

"If you need me to step in, not a problem, if you want me to do the role for whatever, we’ll try and look at it and get it sorted out, I’m just here to help.

“Overall it was a bit of an emotional day for me as you’ve just seen and I’m really pleased, just sorry we didn’t get a win.”

The game itself saw Luton pick up a point courtesy of substitute Luke Berry’s last minute goal, coming after Town had changed to a diamond formation for the final half an hour.

Having seen his side concede inside the opening minute to James Lindsay’s opener on 58 seconds, Harford continued: “I looked up and saw there were 58 seconds on the clock and thought ‘here we go,’ not the start you wanted.

“But I thought it (result) was fully deserved in terms of the possession and the pressure we were putting them under and I thought we deserved more in all fairness.

“We didn’t really change much in terms of the shape of the team.

"We changed just after half time, we just felt we wanted to get a bit more control in midfield as they slightly outnumber you in midfield with the way they play.

"We and not just me, the staff, Alan McCormack, Adrian Forbes and the lads, who were helping me, we just tried to put our stamp on it,

"We didn't need to change things, things are going well here, so we didn’t really need to change a lot.”