Luton head east to shake off away day blues

Tries from Tesh Edwards, Chris Davies, Jack Elston and Sean Meddeman also secured a bonus point for Luton who end their run of four consecutive games on the road without a win.

"It’s been a long time coming,” said an exuberant Chris Parr who took charge of the team alongside Darren Moore for this weekend’s game in the absence of Paul Allen.

Luton commanded the flow of the contest from start to finish and never really looked like losing their grip. In the opening minutes, Luton were awarded a penalty and Hobbs drew first blood for the visitors. After 14 minutes, 27-year-old Edwards opened the scoring with a brawny sprint to score his eighth try of the campaign. Hobbs was unable to follow up. (0-8)

Stuart Tomkinson was sent to the sin bin in the 31st minute and soon after, Ipswich responded with a penalty try. No.10 James Wilson slotted his conversion. A Hobbs' wayward penalty saw the referee bring the first half to a close with the scores, Ipswich 7-8 Luton.

Early in the second half, Chris Davies and Connor Sibley replaced Tyrone Ashton and Jonathan Kerr. Davies made an immediate impression scoring Luton’s second try and with Hobbs adding the extras gave Luton an eight-point lead.

Late tries from Jack Elston and Sean Meddeman and a Hobbs conversion put the result beyond doubt. Final score Ipswich 7-27 Luton.

Luton are currently placed seventh in the North 1 League, six points behind 4th placed Barking.

Skills coach Chris Parr said after the game:

"It’s been a long time coming. It should be good for spirits. We are coming up to Christmas now and it would be easy to switch off. Ipswich is a tough place to come to, its long trip but the boys did really well and hopefully it will be a springboard for good things after Christmas but our focus must first be on Letchworth."

"The players put in a lot of hard work, fight and spirit. You can't ask much more than that. Great character shown by the lads at a tough place and as a coach I couldn't be happier."

On promotion

"We're not thinking about that. If you become too obsessed with promotion and League position you can lose sight of what’s really important and that is getting results. Building the right culture and environment to then go on and win things.”

“If you don’t get your values and foundations right, you can forget about winning anything so as far as we are concerned its about the next game."

The club are still without key players, Michael Weston, Tom Albone, captain Tom Mahendran and Steve Ellis, who is penciled in for a January return.