Berry’s late double crowns comeback

LUTON manager Nathan Jones praised the camaraderie of his players after they overturned a two-goal deficit to claim a point.

A disrupted contest, summed up by six yellow cards in the space of 14 minutes, was reignited by substitute Luke Berry when he converted Pelly Ruddock Mpanzu’s cross from close range.

With 98 minutes on the clock, up popped substitute hero Berry once more to deny Blackburn at the death and seal an impressive comeback.

The contest could have altered dramatically after eight minutes as Darragh Lenihan escaped with a yellow card for a studs-up challenge, forcing Allan Campbell out of the action.

Injuries to Amari’i Bell, Admiral Muskwe and Elijah Adebayo had left Luton light on numbers heading into the contest.

“Nothing prepares you for our last 24 hours,” said Jones. “We lost players through the night, lost one in the warm-up and the last one to an atrocious challenge.

“We thoroughly deserved a point from the match. What we’d been through, we showed real character.”

Blackburn took the lead courtesy of an excellent team goal, with Ryan Nyambe setting up Tyrhys Dolan for his first league goal of the campaign.

The hosts doubled their advantage four minutes later through Harry Pickering’s first goal for Blackburn.

But they were unable to keep a clean sheet for the 15th consecutive league fixture.

Boss Tony Mowbray said: “We’re left frustrated. I thought we did more than enough to win.”

BLACKBURN: Kaminski 6; Nyambe

6, Lenihan 6, Ayala 7, Pickering 8; Travis 7, Rothwell 6 (Magloire 80th); Buckley 7 (Davenport (73rd) 6), Dolan

8, Brereton Diaz 7, Gallagher 6

LUTON: Sluga 5; Bree 6, Burke 6, Naismith 7, Potts 5 (Bradley (45th) 6); Osho 6, Campbell 6 (Lansbury (10th)

6), Cornick 6, Mpanzu 7, Mendes Gomes 6 (Berry (59th) 8); Jerome 6

STAR MAN: Luke Berry

REF: O Langford