U18s thrashed at Man City

We were a well-beaten and demoralised team by the end of the game; a game was mostly won in midfield were Everton conceded control and aggression to City and then the City forwards were skilled enough to score some excellent goals.

Everton's strike force of Ellis, Mampala and Adedoyin were our best players although they made their mark with strong individual runs and then often failed to link up effectively with the other strikers or the supporting midfield. Adedoyin was fast and tricky and was keen to strike from outside the box and he fought to keep the ball from Tom Scully to take the penalty when Ellis was brought down.

City's early goals arose from our defence playing suicide balls inside the penalty area to start attacks and our keeper was guilty of giving the ball to the fullbacks when they had nowhere to go with it. A good hoof up field often looked the best option and would also have been one of our more productive methods of attack as we competed well in the air. Hansen did have a safe pair of hands when dealing with shots and centres.

Thanks for that report on the game, John.

Not to make excuses but that looks like a very young and inexperienced team we put out. Mampala is the only name I recognise, maybe Collins. Have the better kids all moved up to the U23s?

As Dave said, appreciate the match report John.

A lot of players I expected to see were not there and Yes, it did seem a very young side and that could explain why Man City had much more ring craft – although I don't know the age of their players. I was disappointed not to see Gordon and Astley and there are other players now in our U23 team that are still eligible for selection at U18, such as Denny and Ouzounidis. I saw that Nathan Moore is having a trial with Bolton so maybe some other players have been released,

It was my first chance to see all of these players live and I was keen to see Adedoyin, who recently scored 4 in one game, and Ellis looks to be a good finisher from the match highlights shown on the OS.

Mackenzie Hunt started well but faded very quickly. Tom Scully hit the bar from one free kick. Collins did look to me to perform best in our defence but, when a team is overrun to that extent, it's hard for anyone to come out with credit.

I thought there was a Tweet from Tom Scully a week or two back that seemed to imply he had left the club? Clearly not so, according to the teamsheet!