Sunderland host Luton Town in the Championship on Wednesday.

Luton Town are expected to be without four key first team players for their Championship clash with Sunderland on Wednesday evening, according to a Hatters expert.

Matt Bloomfield’s side travel to the Stadium of Light in an unexpectedly tough position, and currently find themselves 23rd in the table, two points adrift of safety, after having suffered relegation from the Premier League last season.

For their part, the Black Cats are looking to bounce back from an underwhelming draw with Watford last time out, during which they gave an uncharacteristically lacklustre account of themselves on home soil. Their most recent meeting with Luton ended in a 2-1 victory at Kenilworth Road back in October, and will be hoping to take six points from a side who ended their Championship play-off dreams in 2023.

And their cause could be boosted by the absence of a quartet of familiar faces for the visitors. In an interview with The Echo, Mike Simmonds of our sister title Luton Today, explained: “I think the long-term ones [injury absences]... Teden Mengi would still be out. Tom Lockyer is not going to be playing this season. Reece Burke and Tahith Chong... I think they are still doubts for this game because they've been out for a while as well. So I think those are the main injury concerns.

“It has been a bit better recently. They've got people like Mads Andersen, who has come back now, and they've actually got some options to choose from rather than just having to put anyone in they can.”

In their most recent outing, Luton ended a run of 12 successive away defeats with a 1-1 draw at Sheffield Wednesday - a result that manager Bloomfield was quick to emphasise the significance of. Speaking after the final whistle, he said: “I think it’s really important. If you look at the Oxford performance, the psychology of that and we probably played a lot better football that day.

"We scored two goals but ended up losing the game, so to stop the rot and finish it the way we did with some blocks was good. In football everyone would like it to be rosy all the time, but it’s not and you build really deep and strong connections when you’re in the trenches together. The boys did that today and I’m really, really pleased with that.”

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Addressing his own side’s sharing of the spoils with Watford at the weekend, Le Bris said: "I'm a bit disappointed. We started well and we finished well... it wasn't really a surprise the challenge we faced today because we knew before the game that this team was very powerful, with many players with high pace. I think probably it suits perfectly our weaknesses, we are well organised but we are not as powerful and so in 1-v-1 we were dominated. In that kind of situation the best solution is to work together, but I don't think we did this in the first half.

“They had the ball and we faced that challenge. It's never easy to find one single reason but at the end of the game we spoke about the pressure, we could have been more efficient. But because they were able to play long and to then keep the ball in 1-v-1, it's never easy to apply a press. So the other side is to keep the ball [instead] and then the opponent can't play long to their strength. We didn’t do this.”

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