‘The Boys Were Outstanding’ – Barradell’s Praise For Palace Win
- Leicester City Under-18s beat Crystal Palace 5-1 last weekend
- Coach Adam Barradell was delighted with the performance level
- The young Foxes are back at home in the league on Saturday
- Southampton are the visitors to LCFC Training Ground (11am kick-off)
The young Foxes defeated the Eagles 5-1 at LCFC Training Ground last Saturday, recording just their second win of the U18 Premier League South campaign, and had to come from a goal down after falling behind to Junior Dixon’s sixth-minute strike for the visitors.
Barradell, speaking to LCFC.com after the game, credited the way the team adapted during the 90 minutes to turn it around and come away with a big margin of victory against a side sitting second in the table.
“It was a real positive performance with lots of individual performances that came together on the day,” the coach assessed. “Crystal Palace is always a tough game, and they started the game very well and put us straight on the back foot by scoring early.
“But I thought the group and individuals regrouped well. We defended well and looked very organised and difficult to beat. At half-time, we spoke as a group about being more positive and pressing the game. We changed our shape to press and that impacted the game really well.
“The boys were outstanding in terms of how they executed what we talked about at half-time as a group. We scored just before half-time, which gave us a really positive mindset going into the break.
“And then in the second half I thought they carried out the plan really well. There were some great finishes, some really positive work in possession and also out of possession. It was a day in which everything came together for us. It was a really pleasing day.”
Goals were shared across the team, as Reece Evans, Abdullah Javaid, Jayden Joseph, Freddie Cook and Logan Briggs all added their names to the scoresheet in Seagrave. Leicester have now doubled their tally of league goals for the season.
The result has also lifted the Foxes up to ninth in U18 Premier League South, on seven points from their first six games in the 12-team division.
Barradell continued: “We’d scored five goals in the league before Saturday, so we’d spoken about being more positive with our attacking play and players making more runs off the ball and getting into dangerous areas.
“To have five different scorers on the day was fantastic but it’s all the work the boys have been doing. The result was great, but they’ve showed glimpses of that performance level in weeks gone by.
“Sometimes they’ve got the results, sometimes they’ve not, but that’s development. What they have shown, is that they can do it against a really strong team in Crystal Palace and they can show consistency for 90 minutes. That’s one thing we spoke about as a group.
“As we’ve always said, it’s more important that we’re developing individuals that are moving through the pathway and getting into that Development Squad, as we are seeing at the moment.
“The number of scholars playing in there currently is fantastic and hopefully we can carry on that as a group of Under-18s players and staff. But we want to be competitive and climb the table. We want to be being more consistent within the performances and certainly relive some of the experiences we had last year.”
City’s youngsters meet title holders Southampton at LCFC Training Ground on Saturday (11am kick-off) in their next league fixture. Although the Saints are currently bottom of the league this term, without a win in five, Barradell is not underestimating the quality within their ranks.
He added: “It’s always a really good game against Southampton. We know what to expect from them. We know they’re going to be hard to play against. They are going to press the game.
“The current league table doesn’t really show the quality of team they are. They are going to be a difficult opponent to play against.”
All times BST.