U-18s vs Newcatle

On a cold, wet, windy afternoon at Carrington, United's Under-18's were well beaten by a strong physical Newcastle United side. As the teams lined up for the midday kick-off, every player in the United side was smaller than their counterparts, a factor that will make it hard on the young United lads for most of the campaign.

Febian Brandy gave United the lead after good build up play from Christy Fagan, scoring from about eight yards out. However Newcastle deservedly equalised within ten minutes. Then on the stroke of half-time Brandy scored his and United's second with a clever chip over the Geordie keeper.

With the wind behind them in the second half, it was thought that United would have the advantage, however, Newcastle dominated the play and scored a third after a mistake from Craig Cathcart. Newcastle went further ahead and scored a soft goal after Zieler and Michael Lea failed to deal with a low cross into the box. To be fair to Lea, it was his first game back from a long injury, as he was recovering from scar tissue on his thigh.

The United lads battled hard and never gave in but were simply not strong enough......with a number of 16 year-old's in the side the Reds have what is possibly the youngest team in the league.

Team: Zieler, Eckersley, Lea, Chester, Cathcart, McCormack, Derbyshire, C. Evans, Brandy, Fagan, Bryan

Sub: Drinkwater (6), Welbeck (7)

Scorers: Brandy 2

A point of interest.....United had five Manchester lads in the side (Ecks, Brandy, Bryan, Drinkwater & Welbeck), two from just outside Manchester (Chester & Lea) and four from Ireland (McCormack, Evans, Cathcart and Fagan)

Back to our roots!

Finally, the under 16's were 3-1 up with 15 mins to go on the all weather pitch.
 
TonyPark said:
On a cold, wet, windy afternoon at Carrington, United's Under-18's were well beaten by a strong physical Newcastle United side. As the teams lined up for the midday kick-off, every player in the United side was smaller than their counterparts, a factor that will make it hard on the young United lads for most of the campaign.

Febian Brandy gave United the lead after good build up play from Christy Fagan, scoring from about eight yards out. However Newcastle deservedly equalised within ten minutes. Then on the stroke of half-time Brandy scored his and United's second with a clever chip over the Geordie keeper.

With the wind behind them in the second half, it was thought that United would have the advantage, however, Newcastle dominated the play and scored a third after a mistake from Craig Cathcart. Newcastle went further ahead and scored a soft goal after Zieler and Michael Lea failed to deal with a low cross into the box. To be fair to Lea, it was his first game back from a long injury, as he was recovering from scar tissue on his thigh.

The United lads battled hard and never gave in but were simply not strong enough......with a number of 16 year-old's in the side the Reds have what is possibly the youngest team in the league.

Team: Zieler, Eckersley, Lea, Chester, Cathcart, McCormack, Derbyshire, C. Evans, Brandy, Fagan, Bryan

Sub: Drinkwater (6), Welbeck (7)

Scorers: Brandy 2

A point of interest.....United had five Manchester lads in the side (Ecks, Brandy, Bryan, Drinkwater & Welbeck), two from just outside Manchester (Chester & Lea) and four from Ireland (McCormack, Evans, Cathcart and Fagan)

Back to our roots!

Finally, the under 16's were 3-1 up with 15 mins to go on the all weather pitch.
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thanks again for thses updates Tony, just to far for me to get to see the youngsters these days so rely on you and MUTV to keep me up to date. Great to hear of so many local lads in under 18's, although it must have much to do with the FA's stupid "time from ground" rule
 
Seems like our U18s have been struggeling a bit so far this season...

Btw, do you know why Eikrem was left out?
 
Eikrem and Gailbraith on international duty? Amos is at least.
Any unused subs?
Do you have the team for the u-16s, Tony?
 
maybe most of our u-18 side are 16 and so we won't see the best of them till next season at that level?

Jus guessing cos I don't know
 
oskarutd said:
Eikrem and Gailbraith on international duty? Amos is at least.
Any unused subs?
Do you have the team for the u-16s, Tony?
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Welbeck and Drinkwater were the only subs...........no idea of the U-16's team...

All others on international duty as you say.....
 
thank you, tony. man, brandy is shit hot these days.
 
I think we have a big problem with the current set of lads....with so many players out on loan quite a few of them will be asked to play reserve football..

Craig Cathcart will be the first to step I believe Hewson also.....that leaves us with very little experience with mainly sixteen year-olds playing in the u-18's....they are very small and get knocked off the ball very easily...

Most team are bigger and more physical.......Eikrem is a lovely player with good vision and some neat passing....McCormack gets stuck in and Derbyshire tries to keep things ticking over in midfield...

But we just don't have a physical presence at all.....I hope some of the u/16's can make the step up but we will have to wait and see....

Brandy and Fagan work hard and have good skill but knocking the ball to their feet and into the channels is our only option really....

Zieler has made a few errors recently and that makes the defence shaky...let's hope for better luck at Leeds on Saturday...

Interested in other thoughts from what you have seen on MUTV or other sources....
 
The reality is if you have a good coach he will tell you results mean next to nothing at youth level. The "best" teams pack themselves out with mature players, rather than talented ones. The reason youth football in England has declined over recent years has been the obssesion with results. Fill a squad with powerful players and naturally they will swamp their under-developed peers, but in ten years time they will be stacking shelves in Sainsbury's.

Players like Danny Rose and Eirkem will normally suffer as a result being very late developers, physically. Today we still produce the physically dominant and powerful players that we’ve always done. What we no longer produce are the technically gifted players. The reason for this is simple - and is a global malaise - the obsession with results has permeated youth football. Winning at all costs has become the watchword.

Basically this means ability takes a backseat and physical maturity becomes the main selection criteria. Talent isn’t nurtured as it should be anymore. Youth football should be about learning and improving. Results don’t count for shit. Sadly this isn’t just a problem within the professional game. Taking it to an even earlier stage and park football - the attitudes of parents and coaches with the 5-11 year olds is a disgrace.

It is vital for the kid to learn his trade first. What happens is the gifted players are not picked for the youth team for the same reasons they wouldn’t be picked for the first team - they are not able to physically compete. The whole point of youth football is a safe environment where results don’t hurt so you can teach these kids their trade while they grow. Nowadays it gets treated as first team football with an age restriction. For the very late developers this is a disaster as they are no longer eligible for youth football by the time they have developed sufficiently.

As an aside the fixation with build doesn’t help the gifted early developers either. They often get ordered to use their bulk and are made to neglect their technical abilities. It is a rare kid who has the foresight to work on that off their own backs, they generally believe their clubs will do right by them.
 
skeeta said:
The reality is if you have a good coach he will tell you results mean next to nothing at youth level. The "best" teams pack themselves out with mature players, rather than talented ones. The reason youth football in England has declined over recent years has been the obssesion with results. Fill a squad with powerful players and naturally they will swamp their under-developed peers, but in ten years time they will be stacking shelves in Sainsbury's.

Players like Danny Rose and Eirkem will normally suffer as a result being very late developers, physically. Today we still produce the physically dominant and powerful players that we’ve always done. What we no longer produce are the technically gifted players. The reason for this is simple - and is a global malaise - the obsession with results has permeated youth football. Winning at all costs has become the watchword.

Basically this means ability takes a backseat and physical maturity becomes the main selection criteria. Talent isn’t nurtured as it should be anymore. Youth football should be about learning and improving. Results don’t count for shit. Sadly this isn’t just a problem within the professional game. Taking it to an even earlier stage and park football - the attitudes of parents and coaches with the 5-11 year olds is a disgrace.

It is vital for the kid to learn his trade first. What happens is the gifted players are not picked for the youth team for the same reasons they wouldn’t be picked for the first team - they are not able to physically compete. The whole point of youth football is a safe environment where results don’t hurt so you can teach these kids their trade while they grow. Nowadays it gets treated as first team football with an age restriction. For the very late developers this is a disaster as they are no longer eligible for youth football by the time they have developed sufficiently.

As an aside the fixation with build doesn’t help the gifted early developers either. They often get ordered to use their bulk and are made to neglect their technical abilities. It is a rare kid who has the foresight to work on that off their own backs, they generally believe their clubs will do right by them.
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I agree with you, but you have to appretiate the winning mentality as it is a key part of any sport which determinds the best from the not quite there.. A key example of this is Roy Keane.. If you don't have the mentality to win at all cost you will never reach the top!!!
 
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