Wayne Rooney’s Plymouth Argyle Luton Town 3-1 in a tense Championship encounter at Home Park, as Ibrahim Cissoko’s brace secured a massive home win for the Championship side.
Rami Al Hajj needed just eight minutes of his first start to get his first Argyle goal as he curled into the top corner from the edge of the box after some good interplay.
Plymouth spurned further chances to increase their lead before the break while Elijah Adebayo should have levelled for the Hatters.
Substitute Ibrahim Cissoko blasted the hosts further ahead with 20 minutes to go, only for Victor Moses to pull a goal back less than two minutes later.
The Hatters piled on the pressure as the game drew to a close, but they could not find an equaliser before Cissoko scored a third in stoppage time as manager Wayne Rooney guided the Pilgrims to back-to-back home victories for the first time this season.
“I thought first half we were good at times, controlled the tempo of the game and Luton tried to press us, and I think when we showed composure and played through the press we caused them problems,” Wayne Rooney, Plymouth Argyle head coach, told BBC Sport.
Luton came into the game after back-to-back league wins for the first time since last December, when they beat Newcastle and Sheffield United in successive Premier League games.
But it was Argyle that went ahead as Al Hajj’s wonderful, controlled strike gave the hosts an early lead after Ryan Hardie neatly laid off Michael Obafemi’s pass into the Swede’s path on the edge of the box.
The hosts should have been further ahead just three minutes later when an unmarked Obafemi flashed Morgan Whittaker’s cutback wide of the near post from 12 yards as the Pilgrims began to take control.
“Second half we were a little bit sloppy with the ball and gave it away in dangerous areas at times, but I thought defensively our back four, and in particular the two centre-backs, were excellent.”
“Luton are very good at set-pieces and I thought we were brilliant defending them and showed great character and desire to go and head the ball, and then the attacking players get all the praise when they score the goals,” Rooney said.
Luton began to assert themselves as the half wore on – Tahith Chong had a close-range strike from a tough angle blocked while Adebayo headed a free kick over the bar as the Hatters got some joy from longer balls over the Plymouth defensive line.
“Credit to the opposition, at both ends of the pitch they were better – they were more ruthless at one end and defended better at the other.
“I think we got into their final third 40-odd times, twice as often as they did, but we didn’t make their goalkeeper work enough.
“We weren’t clinical enough at one end and then didn’t defend well enough at the other -it’s not a good recipe to win a football match,” Rob Edwards, Luton Town manager said.
