Everton U21s defeated at Accrington in the EFL Trophy

Armstrong scored our goal with a good effort from 20 yards. Accrington scored the winner near the end after a breakaway goal following a poor pass by Benjamin.

Benjamin's speed with ball is quite impressive though and he is quite good at remaining in control of the ball whilst moving forward. He should develop his game naturally either in this team or out on loan where he, hopefully, would have more seasoned players around him. At the moment, he, to my mind, is still just a speedy prospect who may or may not fullfil his promise.

Time will tell but let us hope, although he isn't ready yet, I don't think a move up to the first team, as has been suggested elsewhere, would be beneficial to him. Far too soon for that.

I assume this was streamed live on Sky Sports+ last night? I can't see any opportunity for watching a replay… which is probably just as well.

I had hoped that someone else had watched it and said what they thought of it to compare to my thoughts. It seems not yet at least although there is still time I suppose. I don't think you missed much though.

As for the U21s providing a stepping stone to the first team, Dyche isn't going to have much to choose from, I'm afraid, if the showing last night is anything to go by. Unfortunately.

Whenever I've managed to get a stream of the U21s, it's been a chore and a challenge to keep engaged, so I can imagine just what this one was like.

The pity is that this was the cream of our Academy against a team that is currently 88th out of 92 in the English elite league standings, and we fail to progress in this competition of something like the 8th time out of 9.

The U21s were rather disappointing considering Accrington made ten changes from their starting lineup last Saturday, effectively fielding a team of reserves.

I don't normally criticise our players on here (other than Jack Harrison) but sadly Omar Benjamin was disappointing and more alarmingly Roman Dixon was quite poor and looked nowhere near the standard expected of him. Isaac Heath and Jacob Beaumont-Clark made some good runs down the wings but with no end product, reminiscent of a certain on-loan player in the first team.

Meanwhile, Harrison Armstrong, the one standout player who contributed a well taken goal, was substituted after 70 minutes; perhaps Dyche told Paul Tait that he would be required to warm the bench again at Southampton.

We had good seats in the main stand purchased online (£5 for seniors!) and at half-time were able to enjoy a drink in the spacious bar behind the stand with heating, large tv screens and comfortable chairs, an excellent facility open to all.

Well, that's me told then!

Sounds like you had a decent time, Ian, despite the limited performance and result.

I'm disturbed by your report on Roman Dixon who I liked in that Spurs game. Seems he's regressed back into the U21s after that flirtation with fame and fortune under Dyche… who probably sees what you saw.

I tell myself his decline is directly because Dyche did not continue to pick him or give him playing time at least as a substitute, and it has severely dented his confidence. However, this narrative is lacking any supportive evidence.

As this game shows, U21s football is of a very very low standard. We wouldn't expect any of these Accrington players to step up to our first team – and they are probably playing a higher standard than our U21s.

Anyone who still needs to develop after about 15 or so U21 games is unlikely to make it. The standard in the Premier League is just so high you need to be exceptional.

I don't think Dixon was too bad v Spurs and showed some good points as an attacking player, I think he showed his limitations v Southampton in the league cup tie giving some silly fouls away in dangerous areas including one of the free kicks Southampton scored from.

We are seriously lacking in the full-back area no matter who is playing there with Young possibly the best this season and I don't think Dixon is ready yet to claim a place in the team.

The lad has talent and pace to burn.

If a young player is going to be any good at all, the club already knows before they even become regulars at U18 level – and they are promoted to the first team with barely a handful of proving games for the U18s, and often none at all for the U21s.

Late developers – who in fact appear to be extremely rare – might need time in the U21s but any promise shown means they'll be out on loan before their feet touch the ground.

Leaving an overwhelming number of also-rans to work out their mundane apprenticeships in the awful U21s before they find a lower league club to join or they just fade away.

When they were "the Reserves" back in the day, you could kind of see some point in it...

Perhaps the justification for the Academy is that they are giving every opportunity to all players with talent to reach the top… in the certain knowledge that so very very few of them will.

But let's say 90% of all Academy players stay in the game at some level appropriate to them (with 0.0003% actually playing in the Premier League!). Does that constitute 'success' for the system? Is that the way you see or expect it to work?

[Disclaimer: I do not know what the real numbers are.]