U16 MTYouth. Saturday NYL vs DLFC Black

U16s 4-2 DLFC Black

Another excellent win for the boys today as we continue our progression as a team. 

We started a little slow and allowed the opposition to dictate a little for the first 10- 15 minutes and found ourselves behind. Again like last week we kept playing our way and and started to play some excellent passing football. We got ourselves level very quickly with Dante smashing the ball home from the edge of the box. 

We kept playing the style of football we want the lads to and the chances started to come . We went 2-1 from a deflected shot from Tyler that caught the opposition keeper out but at this point we very much deserved it. We then went 3-1 up when Niko cut in from wide right and bent a screamer into the top bins giving the keeper very little chance. 

We then dropped off the pace a little bit and allowed the opposition back in. A big deflection sending Isaac the wrong way after we had failed to clear our lines although the ref didn’t give an offside in the build up which was flagged by the linesman. The game then became scruffy for 10 mins. We made changes to get the legs back into midfield and with a few minutes remaining we scored the 4th goal which finished off the game. Liam breaking out from the number 6 role driving through the opposition before calmly laying the ball out to JJ who cut inside his man and calmly finished into the bottom corner. A well deserved 3points. 

Another great performance from the lads today. Probably some of the best football I’ve seen at grassroots level for a good few years. Our ball retention for most of the game was fantastic and some of our link up play through midfield and into the wide attackers was a pleasure to watch. On top of that we have learned what we need to do out of possession interms of having that desire to go and hunt in pairs and win the ball back quickly and with some brilliant additions to our back line I genuinely believe we are in for a very good season with this group of lads.

Goals

JJ x1

Niko x1

Dante x1

Tyler x1

Standouts

The whole team were excellent but we went with 2 players

Josiah RB - strong as an ox in the challenge, fast and good with his feet. His 1v1 defending was excellent and his attacking support play was also very good. 

Niko RW- Niko is a box of tricks when he’s running at the opposition. He can go beyond them both ways and today he also showed he can play little give and goes to get himself beyond the defender too. He also has the awareness of when to recycle possession and try to create a new angle to receive in. He was a constant threat all game , putting in some fantastic crosses and contributing with a brilliant strike from distance. 

Another excellent day for the boys and already looking forward to watching them again next week. 

On a sour note Connor James had to come off in the second half and it has been confirmed he has completely snapped his collar bone following a poor challenge from the opposition player. 

It took the shine off what was a great morning of football 👍