After a good run of form - picking up five points from the first three matches after the restart - Town suffered a 5-0 loss against Reading on Saturday, leaving them five points adrift of safety.
Prior to defeat against the Royals, the Hatters were unbeaten in six matches, form they will quickly hope to recapture.
Barnsley, who are one point and one place above the Hatters, also suffered a defeat on Saturday – losing 4-0 to Stoke City after opening up their restart campaign with two wins and a draw from three matches.
Nathan Jones said:
(Please note these quotes are taken from Nathan’s post-match Zoom press conference on Saturday, which you can watch below)
On preparations for Barnsley: “They’ve had an away journey today, they’ve got to travel all the way back to Barnsley, they’ve then got to come down here, so they’re in a similar situation to what we were. It’s tough, these are not normal circumstances where you always get time to work with them. You’ve got nine games in just over 30 days, and that doesn’t happen unless you are a Champions League side. It’s tough so you have to make sure you are careful with them, got to dust them down, prepare well. It’s going to a tough, tough game because there is so much at stake, but we’ve got to get them ready and we will.”
The importance of the next two games: “It’s the biggest week this football club has had in a long time. The thing that everyone says, we come off three difficult games against promotion-chasing sides but the effort they’ve had to put in, it showed today because there was so much wrong today. It was just literally chalk and cheese from the three performances we’ve had beforehand. What we’ve got to make sure we do is recover well because it’s a massive week. Two massive, massive games coming up that we have to take points from because if we don’t, then our fate could be sealed.”
Who?
Winners of the FA Cup in 1912, Barnsley are a historic English football club who have had their fair share of success since they were founded in 1887.
The club won the 2016 Football League Trophy, beating Oxford United 3-2 in the final, and the 2016 League One play-offs beating Millwall 3-1 at Wembley.
They were relegated from the Championship in 2018 but regained their place in the second tier the following campaign, finishing second behind the Hatters in League One last season.
When and where?
Kick-off is 6pm at Kenilworth Road on Tuesday 7th July.
Man in the middle?
The referee for tonight's game is Dean Whitestone, who has taken charge of 28 games this season and produced 78 yellow cards and three reds.
Whitestone took charge of our 2-1 away defeat against Birmingham in October and was more recently in the middle for the 3-3 draw with Fulham on Boxing Day.
Played before?
The Hatters earned their first Championship win of the campaign with a 3-1 victory against Barnsley in August with Jacob Butterfield, James Collins and Harry Cornick getting on the scoresheet. Despite more recent success over the Tykes, it’s Barnsley who possess the superior all-time head-to-head record with 27 wins compared to Town’s 24.
Follow the action
If you are not a season ticket or match ticket holder but you wish to purchase a match pass to watch today's game against Barnsley on iFollow Hatters, they are now available for £10 by clicking the image below.
