It’s weird though, we’re top but we never really play well and the football is rough on the eyes.
....I think it’s because it’s a largely settled team that has been together for a while. I recall an opposition Manager saying Everton U23 are a true test because they are set up like a league team.
Look at the utter crap at the top of that league, says its all about how poor this level is.
Stop making sense.
You missed my point , which was that we’d have learnt more about Mampala coming on at 75 mins than we would from Foulds.
I honestly didn’t think the defence needed shoring up, we’ve by far the best defensive record in this league and three of the best young defenders we’ve had for a while in Feeney, Astley and Gibson. The defenders gel together, have a clear understanding of what they need to do and the confidence to execute the plan. I’d have been shocked if we’d have let one goal in in the last 15 mins let alone two. I’d have trusted the defenders and concentrated on the attack side, just my view point.
This from Lewis Gibson illustrates the confidence our young defenders have.
“We are very strong defensively at the moment in one-v-ones, and we are aggressive and compact.
"When we go 1-0 up, we feel we can shut up shop and hold onto that.
“Obviously at our level it is not always the same back four but we have just got a way of playing. We all know our jobs and how important defending is and how massive it can have an effect.
summerisle
The rain, it raineth every day
Never heard of him.
They’re very good Cat 1 academies mate.
Was Pedro Neves not quite highly rated?
Ring master
Player Valuation: £90m
It looks like our Q/F fa Youth Cup game date is now set,down to be Tuesday 7pm [week today] at West Brom,which is same night we find out as long as we win who we get in the semi finals-Man city or Bournemouth
He’s been with us a few years, I think we got him from Charlton and he’s got Portuguese and Brazilian qualifications. He was touted as a skilful winger, never made much impact last season so we tried him at right full back for a while in the u18s. Again not a lot of impact and when we tried the same with Kyle John , moving him to full back , he was the better player and Neves didn’t feature much afterwards.
We did similar to this last season, telling the 2nd year Scholars early around about Jan /Feb if they weren’t getting a contract and allowing them to get another club. Good luck to him , I think we’ll hear about a few more moving on.
I wonder what’s happened to Kieran Phillips and if he’s injured or being moved on.
The Keeper looks very good too!
No I understood the point, and I'm not saying it's wrong, I'm just putting forward an alternative view.
Often what people (not necessarily you in this instance) mean when they say 'we'd have learnt more...' or the like is really 'I wanted us to...'. It's like when people say 'we should see how Simms does at a higher level', what they mean is 'I desperately want to know if Simms is good enough to become a first team player and I will make me feel better if he appears to be progressing really quickly' rather than they think it would be good for his footballing development. It's the same here, there's still lots to be learnt from these things, playing a different formation, changing tactically during a game, players possibly changing position or being asked to perform a different role. My point was that it's not just a case of whether we would have conceded in this particular game, it's whether there's a long term benefit to doing these things, which goes beyond just giving another attacking player a run out for the hell of it.
...not sure if you mean the first team, but he’s only used sparingly at U23 level. Anthony Gordon is a Forward who seems to now get more game time in the older age group.
