Morgan Roberts opened the scoring for the hosts after ten minutes, before Elliot Lee equalised three minutes later. Harry Cornick then doubled his side’s lead five minutes before the break as he fired in from six yards out.

The Cobblers levelled the score ten minutes after the restart through Roberts, but Lee struck once again to give the Hatters the victory.

Both sides had a number of first team players involved, with the hosts’ side including Matt Crooks, Yaser Kasim, Aaron Pierre and Dean Bowditch.

Gomez said: “We wanted a competitive game and that’s exactly what we had. We wanted some of our first team players to get game time rather than training, Northampton had a few of their first team players involved as well.

“They were competitive and so were we. We were pleased for the players involved. It’s very important for us that they were involved, because they are going to important to us.

“We were excellent, we stopped them playing, we made them kick it out, we won the first ball and most of the second ones. In possession we were brave, we played out from the back and we had most of the possession.

“We should have been a little bit better in the final third, but we dominated the game. We had a couple of lapses of concentration and it cost us a couple of goals, but we upped the tempo in the second half and we dominated.

“We are very pleased. Harry Cornick got a goal and Elliot Lee got two, Aaron Jarvis came on as well. The rest of the team did really well.”

Deadline day signing Jarvis was making his first appearance for the Town, with Gomez pleased with what he saw from the 19-year-old: “He played 45 minutes. The forwards played well. He got in behind a couple of times, he did well. He won a couple of headers, he covered a lot of ground and showed a good intensity.”

The Hatters line-up:

Shea (Isted 70), Famewo, Mullins, Musonda, Senior, Cotter, Read, Cook (Peck 75), McQuoid (Richardson 75), Lee, Cornick (Jarvis 46)