O'Connor 'Thoroughly Enjoys' City Under-23s Debut

Development Squad
04 Jan 2020
2 Minutes
Irish defender Darragh O'Connor was delighted to make his Leicester City Development Squad debut in Friday's 5-1 victory over Wolverhampton Wanderers.

- Leicester City's Development Squad defeated Wolves 5-1 at Holmes Park on Friday night
- Defender Darragh O'Connor was making his Under-23s debut for the Football Club
- The young Irishman says he 'thoroughly enjoyed' the experience in Whetstone
- The  Foxes next head to Tranmere Rovers in the Leasing.com Trophy on Tuesday

George Thomas opened the scoring before an Admiral Muskwe brace and further efforts from Luke Thomas and Darnell Johnson sent the Foxes up to second in Premier League 2 Division 1.

O'Connor, who hails from Clonroche and signed for the Club from League of Ireland side Wexford in the summer, played the full 90 minutes on his maiden outing at Holmes Park.

Asked to describe how he felt at full-time on LCFC TV, the 20-year-old said: "A bit sore! There was a tackle there in the second half and I got a dead calf, but I thoroughly enjoyed it.

"I’ve been working since I’ve joined in August to come and play, so I got my chance, and hopefully I showed I can be involved on Tuesday again.

"It's very different from the League of Ireland, that's more about winning the second balls… here, you play football.

"That’s what I wanted to do when I was younger, so I can’t really complain to be honest with you.

"I was in the dressing room before and the boys were giving me confidence and talking me through everything that’ll happen during the game.

"Throughout the game, the boys were onto me saying ‘well done’ or if I’d messed up, they’d get onto me, to make myself a better player.

"So, it was good playing with the first team players, Matty James and Bartosz [Kapustka], and then you have the experienced lads, George, Darnell and Viktor [Johansson]."

After such an emphatic start to 2020, City's youngsters next head to Tranmere Rovers on Tuesday for a Round 3 tie in the Leasing.com Trophy - and O'Connor hopes to be involved. 

"It was a good result," he added. "Obviously, we’re disappointed that we conceded a goal, but we responded well to conceding a goal.

"We bounced back and got the fifth, so we’re delighted in there. We’re going to bounce back now on Tuesday.

"Obviously, starting the New Year, you always want to start off with a win. It builds confidence for us to win against Tranmere on Tuesday, which will be very good for us.

"It’ll be a good test, so it was a great start. It’s a 5-1 win, so you can’t really complain with that."