NATHAN’S NARKED BY SLIP UP
LUTON boss Nathan Jones felt it was two points dropped by his promotionchasing side as they were held to a draw by Exeter City.
The Hatters fell behind to Jake Taylor’s second goal in as many games on the hour mark, but ensured a share of the spoils as Danny Hylton powered home a 23rd of the season eight minutes later.
Jones said: “It’s two points dropped and I'm bitterly disappointed. Especially after the first half, where we dominated the game, controlled the game, got into real good areas, and then just didn’t quite get the first goal.
“After that, the biggest disappointment was the first ten minutes of the second half as we didn’t do the normal things we usually do and that allowed Exeter to get into the game and then they scored.
“They had one or two chances, one opportunity was clear-cut, but we’ve had so many opportunities second half and got into great areas.
“However, when they got to the by-line, they cut it back and scored. We got to the by-line three times and nothing comes of it.”
The visitors were forced into an early reshuffle when captain Jordan Moore-Taylor suffered a head injury and was replaced by Luke Croll.
Exeter went close on 15 minutes, Reuben Reid’s shot was parried by Matt Macey, while Luton threatened sporadically, Jordan Cook was not too far away with his 30-yard free kick on the half-hour.
Visiting keeper Bobby Olejnik made an excellent stop to keep Jack Marriott’s glancing header out, while Hylton sent the rebound off target.
After the break, Reid’s closerange effort was brilliantly blocked by Alan Sheehan, with the striker wastefully skying the follow-up.
Troy Brown clipped the bar for the visitors after Hylton headed a clearance into him, while Mpanzu’s shot required saving from Olejnik.
However, Exeter had the breakthrough on the hour mark as a glorious sweeping counter-attack ended with the excellent Jack Stacey teeing up Taylor to confidently find the corner.
Home sub Ollie Palmer then saw his effort cleared off the line by Croll, before the striker excellently set up Hylton to level the scores on 68 minutes.
Hylton thought he had won it, only to see his goal chalked out for offside, while Macey had to repel a late Ollie Watkins shot with his legs..
Grecians boss Paul Tisdale said: “We put a lot of effort into what was a really, really tough game. “We played committed and really hard as a team and showed a lot of spirit. We played against a good team, we went ahead, but I’m satisfied with the performance and the point. “It was a really good finish. We'd had the chance just before from a similar position and put the ball over.
“I don't think Reuben has missed from there too often.
“We had four or five really good chances. There were lots of mistakes but as a team we really played together in a frenetic game.”