IPSWICH TOWN 4-2 PREMIER SOCCER ACADEMY
MATCH REPORT.
By the time we played this match with Ipswich Town the players where well and truly feeling at home with life in the UK. As always we play Ipswich under floodlight at the playford road complex on the field nearest the dome. Conditions where perfect as always and as in previous years this fixture was going to be tough.
A 24-hour virus had swept through the area, which was to eventually run through our squad and force the cancellation of the Charlton fixture. During the warm up both center backs had to be withdrawn, Jamie with a niggling groin injury and Taylor with this virus. I had planed for Ben and Daniel to start in the center of the midfield however this changed everything and forced me to play them both as center backs.
The problem now was that we had nobody fit on the bench, Greg was fit again and started so we where down to the bare eleven. This is the disadvantage of taking a small squad, over the past few years we have taken a squad of 22 and although we had other players interested in this years tour I took the gamble of going with 14.
Starting line up; Jake
Matt Ben Daniel Johnny
Glen
Greg Tobin
Aaron
Kris Clayton
Bench; Jamie (inj)
Zac (inj)
Taylor (sick)
Ipswich fielded a mixture of under 14s – 15s so the pace and physical side of this game would give the lads a good work out.
We kept things Tight for the first 10 minutes until Aaron picked up ankle injury, which sidelined him for the rest of the match. Loosing Aaron put us down to 10 men and made the already difficult task impossible but the players battled on and created one or two good chances with Matt and Greg finding themselves in the thick of everything. We went in at halftime 3 goals down which was
not a true reflection on the game so far. Jake had pulled off some fine saves and in general we coped well all things considered. Ipswich hadn’t noticed we had been playing with 10 men for nearly 30 minutes however as we neared half time they realized and offered us a player for the second half.
Curtly was the player who Ipswich gave us to help out and in true footballing spirit he did so with a smile and believe me he didn’t just go through the motions within 10 minutes he opened the scoring for the PSA which lifted the spirits of our lads. In 2000 Gareth Musson a PSA touring player that year, signed for Ipswich Towns academy after impressing during trials. Gareth then went on to score winning goals against us when we played Ipswich Town in 2001 and 2002 so I had no reservations about Curtly nicking a goal for us ha ha. Unfortunately for us Johnny was exhausted and needed a rest, which put us back down to 10 men during which time we conceded the fourth goal. Taylor bravely tried to come on and help out up front but had to be withdrawn soon after. Still we continued to work hard and pushed forward I switch to three at the back which allowed us a second striker and with 10 minutes to go managed to force a penalty which Daniel smashed onto the underside of the bar and across the line to make the score 4-2.
The players where a spent force by the final whistle, by now they had experienced four very different type of matches which is why we picked the opposition we played. Yet again I could not have asked for more from the players. I am not sure but I doubt if many teams this young have traveled so far and played opposition of this quality before. Well done one and all!
Man of the match…Greg