Luton Town’s bid to stay in the Championship suffered a blow as they lost 1-0 at home to a ten man Blackburn Rovers side.

Midtable Rovers had arrived with no win in their previous 8 outings, but a Yuki Ohashi goal won the game for the visitors. Blackburn had seen Kristi Montgomery sent off, but the visitors kept Luton out for the remaining half hour and took the points.

Defeat ended Luton’s five match unbeaten run, and they sit three points from safety with four games of the Championship season still to play.

Having rescued a late point against fellow strugglers Stoke in midweek, Luton had hoped to keep their unbeaten streak going against an out-of-sorts Blackburn side. The visitors’ run of games without a win had sunk their hopes of a finish in the play-offs, with Rovers having recently lost to several teams down the Hatters at the bottom end of the Championship table.

Luton had a few first half opportunities, with Millenic Alli missing the target from close range in the opening minute and Mark McGuinness heading over from a Jordan Clark free-kick.

Blackburn had created little but the visitors would take the lead in the opening stages of the second half. A passing move in the middle teed up Ryan Hedges, who played a fine pass through to Ohashi, and the Japanese striker was able to roll the ball past Thomas Kaminski to put the visitors in front.

Six minutes after taking the lead, Blackburn would be reduced to ten players. Full debutant Montgomery had already been booked when the Blackburn defender was shown another yellow for a foul on Alli and was duly shown a red card.

Blackburn duly provided a stubborn obstacle to try and get the points despite the issue of being a man down.

The Hatters’ best opportunities saw them twice hit the crossbar, with Thelo Aasgaard hitting the bar after a fine slaloming run before Alli saw a deflected shot strike the bar in the ninth minute of second half injury time.

Try as they might, however, Luton couldn’t break the door down as they slip to a reverse that does damage to their aspirations of survival.

The Hatters face a huge contest in their next game, when they travel to play Derby County in a relegation six pointer against the side that currently sit immediately outside the relegation zone.