Youth Team boss on 2-0 defeat to Wigan Athletic...
Youth Team Manager, Neil Woods admitted it was difficult to find faults in his side’s performance despite suffering a 2-0 defeat to Wigan Athletic.Goals in the last five minutes of either half were enough to propel the Latics to top spot in the Youth Alliance League - but that was only half the story.
Woods’ men dominated proceedings from the outset and whilst battling against torrid conditions, the young Saddlers stuck to their task admirably.
“The weather was horrendous and made it a very heavy pitch to play on,” said Woods. “That in itself was a test for us because we haven’t been most competitive all season and outside factors have affected too many times.
“But we dealt with it very well and controlled all of first half. The one criticism is that we only created a few chances and given how much of the ball we had it probably wasn’t enough.
“They then broke away and score form an unfortunate slip and go into the break a goal up.
“I said to the players I was pleased with our performance, especially given the conditions and then we come out for the second half and were even better.
“We dominated the ball again but credit to Wigan for the way they defended. They were well organised and limited us to half chances.
“Pushing for a late equaliser, we then make a mistake five minutes from the end and they kill the game with a second goal.
“I’m disappointed for the boys because of the way they went about the game.
“It certainly wasn’t a fair reflection of the match.”
STARTING XI: Jezeph, Maddocks, Cockerill-Mollett, Sangha, J.Smith, Roberts, Oliver, Shorrock, Peters, Kouhyar, Hayles-Docherty
Subs: King (Hayles-Docherty), Cela (Shorrock)
Unused Subs: Caswell, Vann, R.Smith