AFC Wimbledon boss Neal Ardley heaped praise on his charges despite going down 2-0 at Luton Town on Saturday.

The Dons had to play almost an hour with 10 men after Karleigh Osborne was sent off for two yellow cards in the first half.

Ardley’s men held out until the 79th minute when Jack Marriott broke the deadlock – the striker sealed the win for the Hatters with the second in injury time.

The boss said: “I cannot control the result and the players cannot control the result, but they can control their performance and they did everything right.

“They were not opened up, there were no silly individual errors – I thought we were excellent.”

He added: “I could not see the first booking and the second was a little soft. It’s disappointing that the ref didn’t give a warning like ‘This is your last chance’, but I’m not going to have a go at the ref.

“We changed our shape after half-time. We went with a diamond shape with one up front and we wanted to get more support up there for Adebayo [Akinfenwa] so we played Sean [Rigg] in the hole to protect the middle of the pitch.

“We did it brilliantly and we had chances to get in front. Their first goal in a bobble in the penalty area that could have gone anywhere, and the second was on the break when we were chasing the game.

“But no one likes losing, we’ve gone five games unbeaten and it’s ended. We’ve got to start that again.”

The Dons, now 15th in the League Two table, host Northampton Town, in eighth, on Tuesday night.