There’s no doubt last year’s 2nd year u18 and this year’s 2 years have been way below the standard of previous years. There have been a few individuals, Feeney, Evans, Beni last year, Hornby , Denny this but the overall standard of the players around them has been poor to average. Of the starting 11 for the Youth Cup match 6 were first year u18s . While this hopefully points to a bunch of talented , fast developing 1st years, it also backs up the statement that many of the 2nd years haven’t been good enough. Hornby of course and Con Ouzonidis , presumably injured,were the only two missing.
In both recent games, u18 and U23s , we seemed to have the same traits. Young defenders, who make mistakes but really do look “ good for their age”. Solid but unspectacular DFM pairings in Denny/ Scully and Beni/Adeniran who do the job but don’t provide attacking threat. A good striker leading the line , Mampala at U18, Hornby U23s, but lacking any regular, decent supply to them . In both games there was a dearth of exciting midfield play, only Gordon over the two games provided any real attacking flair, and an ability to open up a defence. For the u18s I thought it was the rigid 4-2-3-1 we used , but even the different u 23 formation didn’t provide any real attacking threat. But both teams are top four in their leagues so I guess they’re not doing too bad.
