FA Youth Cup
Tuesday, 9 September 2008
A coach party of 50 plus four cars travelled to York City on Tuesday for the eagerly awaited FA Youth Cup Tie. As 28 players had declared themselves fully fit and available, the management team most definitely had selection problems, albeit good ones!
Training preparation in the last few weeks had been good, but three consecutive U18 games had been called off for SRCA. In fact only one competitive game - four weeks ago - had been played. York have a youth squad of full time apprentices and had beaten Mansfield and Scunthorpe in the last week.
It was the intention for all players to gather experience of what its like to play at a professional stadium and all enjoyed the pre-match build up standing on the pitch at Kit Kat Crescent. The changing rooms however could not accommodate 32 bodies and I had to make one of my hardest decisions to date, trimming the squad down just to fit in the changing room.
The SRCA team selection was finally:
1 Ryan Graham, 2 Marc Moon, 3 Luke Wilson, 4 Alan Tench, 5 Liam Dunn, 6 Chris Bailey, 7 Chris Youldon, 8 Jordan Hardy, 9 Luke Page, 10 Nat Crinson, 11 Mark Robinson
Substitutes used were Anthony Gamble (30 minutess for 5), Jordan Robson (60 minutes for 10) and Michael Jacob (75 minutes for 8).
The York City side was:
1 Josh Leader, 2 Michael Duckworth, 3 Callum Brown, 4 Sam Burns, 5 Luke Woodall, 6 Dean Lysles, 7 Joe Knowlson, 8 Michael Emerson, 9 Nathan Parker, 10 Adam Boyse, 11 Nick Thompson
Substitutes used were Ryan Qualter, Kingsley Weatherall and Adam Shorfield.
After kick off it was clear that the main threat to the SRCA goal was going to be that of number 10 Adam Boyes. At 17 years of age having already made his first team debut for York, the lad has already been linked with Manchester United and is due to have a trial with Middlesbrough. In the early stages our defenders Tench and Dunn coped well with the fast running forwards, but York opened with excellent movement all over the pitch.
After an opening against 15 minutes of intense York pressure RCA began to get forward and both Page and Youldon were involved in winning corners with two half chances fired at goal. However York were breaking with intense pace from their own box and after 22 minutes it was no surprise when Parker fired in from inside the box.
After 30 minutes there was real hurt for RCA when attempting to attack. A ball seemed to be handled by a York midfielder who hit the ball forward to Boyes who in a flick and turn Dennis Bergkamp would have been proud of, raced into the box and meeting the oncoming keeper … well the inevitable penalty.
We were gutted and Ryan Graham is still, as he felt there was no contact. Boyes stepped up and gleefully slotted home to make it 2 - 0 to York.
There was no time to feel sorry for ourselves as Liam Dunn pulled up with a calf injury and had to be replaced by Gamble.
However as the defence was re-shuffled Boyes again found room to get a second on 42 minutes and to be honest this was an exceptional finish. 0 - 3 and half time.
Second half, I can only say how proud the management team were to see the whole team fight until the final whistle. York were most definitely faster in most areas and were very well drilled in all set pieces. However the SRCA players were not overwhelmed and actually had two goal bound efforts cleared from the York goal-line. Gamble was doing very well at the back, whilst Bailey and Hardy battled hard in the middle of the park. Moon was showing how he enjoys playing at this level, whilst Wilson and Robinson appeared to get stronger in the second half. York are a very strong youth side and finished the game off clinically via Joe Knowlson on 70 minutes and Luke Woodhall on 84. A 5 - 0 reversal but well worth the visit and we will see which of our youth players look back on this life experience.
I will be keeping an eye on the progress of Adam Boyes and what he is sold for in the future!
Sunderland RCA Under 18s player Lee Andrews gives an insight on the York City match from the bench
Some good individual performances from the likes of Ryan Graham, who picked up the Man of the Match Award, and Alan Tench. I think maybe the occasion got to a few people and nerves crept in, but saying that it was some people's first experience of playing at a ground like York City's. It was a decent set up there and also a pretty decent crowd for an under 18s match - 130 was the actual attendance.
There was some good craic going on and people will learn a lot from the experience not just about themselves but about the team, as Owen said on the touchline it is a learning curve for him and the staff and not just the players.
Compared to them we train twice a week and they train around five days a week and are a settled team that have had more time to gel. The effort was there last night but they were more sharper in certain areas due to plenty of game time, we haven't had a game for four weeks so that was understandable.
Overall it was a good effort and a decent performance against a well organised York City side.