Rob Edwards' verdict on Sheffield United after Luton's defeat in crunch relegation clash

Rob Edwards admitted his Luton Town side had suffered a "tough day" after being beaten 3-1 on their home turf by relegation rivals Sheffield United. The win was deserved for the Blades despite Luton dominating the stats, finishing the game with 75 per cent possession and 20 shots on goal.

But Wes Foderingham was the quieter goalkeeper of the two as goals from Cameron Archer, James McAtee (penalty) and Vini Souza sealed a big win for the Blades just seven days after their 5-0 home hammering to Aston Villa. Luton briefly threatened a comeback through Carlton Morris' spot kick but United cut the gap between themselves and the Hatters to seven points, with 14 games to play.

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"A tough day for us," Edwards said. "We made a couple of errors that were really, really costly in the end. It doesn't matter how much of the ball you have, it's what you do with it that counts and we were punished. Goals change the emotions of a game.

"We huffed and puffed but in key moments we came up short and when we had possession we weren't slick or precise enough. Well done to them, they defended well and made the most of their chances. We shot ourselves in the foot for the third goal. We should have dealt with it and they were clinical. They defended the lead very, very well.

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"Congratulations to Sheffield United, we've got Man United next week and have to get ourselves up for it which isn't hard to do. We have to come back better next week. We did dominate massive spells of the game but got punished with a 2-0 loss. I'm taking the penalties out of it. We got punished for two mistakes and you can't at this level. We just couldn't quite find enough quality."

Both penalties in the game were awarded after a VAR review, both for handball with defenders' arms in unnatural positions. First Reece Burke was penalised after Souza's header hit his hand, before the Brazilian then conceded a spot-kick of his own after Elijah Adebayo's header rebounded off an arm.

Edwards said: "Neither were penalties. I don't know what a penalty is anymore. both were jumping for the ball, neither were pens for me. I don't think ours or theirs were pens.It's a little bit strange, once they had theirs we appealed for ours. They check everything, it's not the ref's fault. He was told to go and look at it. It's not the ref's fault."