FA Youth Cup - Result.

[Andy Y. (G&NFC)]

Lost 4 -1 But the result didn't really reflect what happened.

Oxford had a centre forward, head and shoulders (literally!) above the rest of the players on the pitch who scored at least a hat-trick and possibly all four? I believe he is currently playing up front for the Welsh national side.... It showed!

 

Overall, the better side won, but there were some good performances from a number of Fleet youngsters. Think I have the right names here.

 

Our No 9 Serkan Mehmet looked very useful if a little small, he had bags of skill. Yinka Salaam, our No 7 had the beating of his opponent all night and scored a really classy goal. Jake Slade in goal, made a number of useful saves but looked a little vulnerable against crosses when put under pressure.

 

Both sides played some neat attractive football with our lads not at all disgraced. It was thoroughly enjoyable stuff, just a shame there weren't more people to see it.

[Alan W (GNFC)]

The first half was pretty even and both sides had a "goal" disallowed.

 

Unfortunately, a goal 70 seconds after the restart, changed the whole game and meant we had to immediately push forward, leaving us vulnerable at the back, especially against the Oxford Centre Forward, Craig Davies.

 

The second came after 62 minutes - break down the right, driven cross shot, half pushed out by Slade, but stabbed back in through a crowd of players.

 

Yinka Salaam scored the goal of the night, cutting inside the Oxford left back and hitting a fierce left foot effort just inside the near post from 25 yards. Salaam caused Oxford problems all night, and seemed to have 2 good feet as he also swung in a few good balls with his right foot.

 

That was after 68 minutes, but before we had time to really believe we could get back in the game, Oxford went straight down the other end and Davies ran on to a long ball and lifted a neat lob over the oncoming Slade.

 

10 minutes later, as Fleet pressed forward, another long ball out of defence, saw Davies outpace the Fleet defence and slide the ball under Slade.

 

Even then, Fleet had opportunities in the last period of play to get another goal or two back, but it wasnt to be.

 

I'm sure the lads will have learned a lot from the game and had that early goal not gone in, in the second half, who knows??

 

As Andy said, the only disappointing thing was how few people made the effort to turn up to support the boys - those of you who thought they'd sit at home and watch the dreaded Man U or Chelsea on Sky should be ashamed of yourselves!!

 

Incidentally, this is something I found on Craig Davies - just our luck that we should meet them just a few days after he signed foir them !!

 

Craig Davies profile

 

I think we'll be hearing more of him in the future.

[Brian A]

In the main FA competition don't players have to be signed at least 7 days before the fixture...if he was signed on the 17th....suppose that doesn't apply at this level