Oxford United’s under 18 side kept up their impressive form with a convincing 6-1 win at Forest Green Rovers on Saturday.
Football League Youth Alliance
South West Division
Forest Green Rovers 1
Oxford United 6
(James 2, Stevens, Lofthouse, Heap, Hopkins)
Coach Leon Blackmore-Such told us:
“We have been playing well and had a full week to build up to this one with no midweek game. We started well and stuck to the game plan because we know Forest Green like to play out from the back so we pressed high and played at a great tempo and that allowed us to get on top.
“The first goal came with a switch of play that allowed Owen James to touch it past his man and score a good goal and then the second came when Owen cut inside and when he shot it was handled on the line and Jack Stevens made it 2-0 from the penalty spot.
“The third came when Rex Mannings got one on one with the keeper and even though he was tackled the ball ran to Owen who scored his second and gave us a 3-0 lead at half time.
“That sounds great but it is so tight at the top and we know that Exeter scored 12 in a game last week so we talked about the need to stay ruthless and try and improve the goal difference, and just to show they listen to me, after the hour we conceded to make it 3-1!
“Those things happen and we had created other chances and Kyran Lofthouse made it 4-1 when he lifted the ball over the keeper before Aaron Heap scored a penalty for 5-1. The sixth came when Ryan Crooks squared it for Albie Hopkins and that meant we picked up a 6-1 away win and got our reward for a very strong performance.
“It’s not just the results though. We had a player step up from the under 15s- he was brought down for the second penalty and did well- plus there were outstanding performance from a lot of players including Matt Berry-Hargreaves who did really well in defence.
“So plenty of positives to take into our League Cup game against Leyton Orient at Abingdon on Tuesday afternoon.”
United
Clayton, Chilcott, McCreadie, Berry-Hargreaves, Carr, Cowan (Hopkins 75), Heap, Mannings (Lofthouse 60), Crooks, Stevens, James (Ferguson 70)