The Academy/Development squads watch thread 2024/25

[Nameless]

Congratulations to Josh Barratt on his first team debut last night.
To be honest I've seen him play 2 or 3 times and not really seen what the fuss is about but the club clearly rate him as Brian has had him with the senior side a lot this year.

[SCIAG]

Anyway, last night the U21s lost 3-1 to Chelsea. Good match, Fosu and Kuhl our best players, we just got caught on the counter attack too many times.

.... not sure I can agree entirely - thought we were palpably 2nd best all over the field - the back-four were incapable of making a decent clearance - yes Chelski broke fast but for their 2nd & 3rd goals, we'd somehow nicked the ball off of them, then simply passed it straight back - criminally within our own box.

In midfield we were pedestrian and lightweight - Kelly ran around a lot but continually got knocked off the ball - he looked far better further forward after Novakovich went off.

'The Fridge' had a few impressive moments but has some way to develop yet - was also occasionally guilty of giving the ball away, when passing infield. Cardwell looked big and awkward and did cause their back four some problems with his willingness to chase them down but got the impression the Ref didn't like him.

Admittedly missed the first 15' (hadn't realised for u21s they only open the stewards gate nr Gate 3&4 for Lower West ) - I see from the match report that before I got there, he got an assist for our leveller and fed Novakovich close in, who then hit the post - but from what I saw subsequently, honestly didn't think Kuhl had any positive influence on the game at all - which was disappointing bearing in mind, for a spell, he'd got into the fringes of the first team under Sadkins.

By contrast, thought Noor Husin, in his late cameo, looked far more threatening and able to open up Chelsea with a telling pass than Aaron had done in the previous 80'.

Agree with nearly all of that. I don't think we were especially good. Picked out Kuhl because he did create most of our best chances.

Husin's not as "gifted" but much more mobile. I thought he looked good but didn't have time to stamp his authority on the game. Would like to see more of him at the expense of Shaughnessy and the Fridge.

Congratulations to Josh Barratt on his first team debut last night.
To be honest I've seen him play 2 or 3 times and not really seen what the fuss is about but the club clearly rate him as Brian has had him with the senior side a lot this year.

Definitely seen him have some disappointing appearances, but I've seen him have a few games (Sheffield United this season was one of them) were you can tell he's a "proper" footballer. Most of our players have their jobs and they do them quite well. Barrett just doesn't play by the same rules, he attacks space, he'll dribble when it looks like there's nothing on, he suddenly does something you don't expect. Kuhl was similar at that age, or you could compare him to Vydra at his best or Matejovsky's first few matches. I don't know how well that translates to actually becoming a footballer, but he's got talent.

[Royals and Racers]

U 18`s suffered another 1-0 home loss this morning to Man City.

[No Fixed Abode]

https://www.chelseafc.com/news/latest-n ... ading.html

https://www.chelseafc.com/news/latest-n ... sea-3.html

[Royals and Racers]

U18`s are away to Liverpool at 11am on Saturday morning-there should be a stream available as it`s live on LFCTV.

[Royals and Racers]

U18`s got their season back on track with a 4-1 away win at Liverpool.

[Platypuss]

U21s get a last minute penalty equaliser to make it 4-4 at Norwich after being 3-1 up at half time.

[Royals and Racers]

U18`s lost 6-2 at Chelsea yesterday- report http://www.chelseafc.com/news/latest-ne ... ading.html

[sandman]

Under 21's outclassed 3-0 by Man City. Nightmare for poor Osho on both the second and third goals.

[SCIAG]

Yeah, we were never really in the game. We showed a lack of fluency and control.

It was a young side (finished the game with 4 U18s and an U16 on the pitch) but even the older players didn't play well. We used the 4-4-2 diamond that the first team have been using and a few players didn't really look like they knew what to do. We could have used some more width to supply the strikers.

First half Man City had the better of it by far. Watson and Griffin at full back were looking reasonably good on the ball but were outnumbered in defence and ultimately didn't do a great deal going forwards. City's left back got forward really well (though M. Kuhl neutered that a bit by getting Smith to drop onto the right in defence) and their midfielders had way more class. Nobody tore through us like an Aguero or Silva could against the first team but the gulf in class was clear. Ward did very well several times.

Kuhl looks like a shadow of the player he was eighteen months ago, he makes mistakes he never used to, doesn't play the same passes, doesn't even do the captaincy stuff. I still don't really see the point of Shaughnessy. Husin was a bit better but nothing quite came off for him. Barrett is greedy and petulant and didn't especially threaten, although in his defence he made a couple of good runs back to cover for our less mobile midfielders. As for the forwards, well, let's just say it's no wonder they can't get in ahead of Cox and Kermogant. Not sure either of them had a shot on target.

Jules took a nasty knock after about an hour. He played on but was clearly in pain. This roughly coincided with our best spell of the match. Eventually he went off and Griffin moved to centre back. At that point the defence crumbled, most Osho making individual errors but he could have used some better communication from Ward.

If this was supposed to be an audition for spots in the side next year then I suspect only Ward will have done remotely enough to enter condition. Osho and Jules looked a decent pairing at last.

I don't like being negative, and I don't think we were three goals worse than Man City, but ultimately there's not much to get excited about based on that.

[sandman]

Kuhl was dreadful for the first 10 minutes but I thought he picked it up quite well after that.

[Royals and Racers]

U18`s drew 1-1 away at West Ham yesterday

[Doolittle]

Stacey and Fosu both scored in League 2 tonight.

[Royals and Racers]

Another 1-1 draw for the U18`s this morning - home to Blackburn

[P!ssed Off]

Looks like we've got a lad in the England U15s
https://twitter.com/YouthAcademys/statu ... 1951941633
Fabio Sole.

A midfielder judging from previous squad numbers.


Pinched him off Aldershot so I spose we can't have too many complaints when someone pinches him off us.
http://www.theshots.co.uk/wp-content/up ... uates-.pdf

[Royal Rother]

Tommy Doyle - now there's a good old fashioned sounding English football name.

[maffff]

Pinched him off Aldershot so I spose we can't have too many complaints when someone pinches him off us.
http://www.theshots.co.uk/wp-content/up ... uates-.pdf

Along with 6 others

[SCIAG]

Pinched him off Aldershot so I spose we can't have too many complaints when someone pinches him off us.
http://www.theshots.co.uk/wp-content/up ... uates-.pdf

Along with 6 others

More than six, a few of the names at other clubs joined us but were released.

And of those six, some have already left the club.

[Royals and Racers]

U18`s finished off their season on Saturday with a 2-1 home loss to Fulham- so finished up 7th in the top section play-offs which is disappointing after finishing runner up in the regular south section season.

[genome]

Jack Stacey set to be recalled from Carlisle for the final fixture