Luton Town: Hatters boss John Still hints at retirement – but says there’s another promotion in him

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John Still has hinted that his Luton Town tenure is coming to an end – but believes he’ll guide the club to one more promotion before retirement beckons.

The Hatters manager, who turned 65 last month, won the Conference in his first full term in charge but his side’s first campaign back in the Football League came to a premature end on Saturday as they failed to qualify for the League Two play-offs, despite a 2-0 win over Stevenage.

It was a disappointing end to a season which had seen Town spend much of it in contention for back-to-back promotions, but a disastrous March of six defeats in a row – a run which became seven in the first week of April – ultimately put paid to their bid.

Still will return next term for a renewed push for League One but said: “Time is running out for me, at my age, seriously. But in my time here there’s another promotion to be done, without a shadow of a doubt.”

However, he hopes that when his love affair with Luton ends, that he’ll have put the club on the road to continued success.

“On and off the pitch, I look back at two years here and the progress made has been phenomenal,” he said.

“The club has become reunited. I think there is a belief within the town, a belief on the pitch and we just missed out this year. Well, that’s OK, that’s football.

“I have disappointments, of course I have disappointments throughout the season. I was listening to Steve McClaren, with Derby not quite making it [in the Championship play-offs] and he’s disappointed, but he will probably look back on certain things and think he was a little bit unfortunate. We all do that.

“But, at the end of the day, I think all you want as a manager is to keep progressing. Well we’re progressing as a football club.

“For myself, to have come here and got us up [from the non-league] and got us close [to the League Two play-offs] in two years, I’m absolutely delighted.”

That’s not to say that Still was satisfied with an eighth placed finish.

He said: “Would I have settled for this at the start of the season? My answer to that would be no, I wouldn’t have settled for it because I wanted to go up. We’ve done everything we can to go up.

“I can turn around and give as many excuses as I want [as to] why we haven’t gone up. I have. It’s well documented about injuries.

“At the end of the day I’m very proud of where we are. I’ve very proud of the progress we’ve made and I’m very proud of the infrastructure that’s been put into everything.

“On my first day here, I always remember saying about building foundations to build the football club from. When we do that, and we will do that, when John Still’s long gone, if they stay with that this club will grow and grow.”