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Sports Reporter
ZIMBABWE international midfielder Marvelous Nakamba made his first league start for the Hatters since last December, on Saturday as manager Rob Edwards made three changes to the side that took on QPR two weeks ago
Nakamba lasted 68 minutes and was largely impressive, including being part of the build to the only goal of the day as Luton won 1-0 at Millwall in the Championship.
Ahead of the game, Luton boss Rob Edwards stated it will be a case of finding out a ‘new normal’ to allow Nakamba to have the best chance of making an impact for the Hatters in the short term
The 30-year-old was a starring member of the Luton team that won promotion to the Premier League back in 2023, having joined on loan from Aston Villa in the January transfer window. He made the move permanent that summer, but then with the club in the top flight, suffered a serious knee injury that ended his campaign in December last year.
Having battled back to a level of fitness that meant he could take to the field for the first time in over eight months at QPR recently, Nakamba played the first half of the Carabao Cup exit on penalties, producing a performance that excited those watching on, as the Zimbabwean international looked like he had never been away, breaking up play effective and using the ball impressively too.
He was then on the bench for the 2-1 defeat to the same side in their league clash a few days later.
Speaking on just how they will go about keeping him ready to have the best chance possible of featuring on a regular basis, Edwards said:
“He’s progressing well, it’s a real challenge and we had a good chat with him and some of the staff the other day as we do have to manage his body.
“He won’t be able to train necessarily as much as he or us would want him to all the time at the moment, but that’s because there’s a real good plan in place to make sure he’s fit for selection.
“We’ve got to try and get that balance right of getting him fit when he can’t always train every single day, and it’s trying to find that.
“It’s almost a little bit of a new normal for him, so we’ve got to make sure we find that for the foreseeable until we’re confident then that he’s fully there.
“We’ll see how that progresses over the next few weeks and months, but I think Marv is someone who gets better with game time and playing. He’s proved that to us in the past when he first joined here.
“All right he didn’t have the injury then, but he probably wasn’t fully fit when he came in, but just played, played, played, played and got up to speed fairly quickly. So I’m bearing that in mind as well.”
Online Reporter