FA YOUTH CUP QUARTER-FINAL PREPARATION
As you may well have read, last weekend the youth team were knocked out of this season's FA Youth Cup by the current holders, Manchester City, at the quarter-final stage.

Manchester City are unbeaten in all competitions this season and have enjoyed some very comprehensive wins over some of the top youth teams in the country, our lads knew that travelling to Manchester and winning the game was going to very difficult indeed. However, we would make sure we approached the game in the correct manner and were quietly confident of causing an upset having lost only once in our previous 13 matches.

Preparation for the game was key, the training sessions during the week leading up to the game were shaped around our game plan, so tactically the boys were ready. The training day with Dion Dublin and the motivational session he put on ensured the players were ready mentally. Physically the lads were prepared too, with no injuries to report and the whole squad available.

With the match scheduled to be played on Saturday, March 7, the squad travelled to Manchester on the Friday, departing at 9.30am and stopping en route at Coventry City's training ground for a quick training session. It was very kind of Coventry to make their facilities available and I am very grateful to Gregor Rioch and his Academy staff for this gesture.

Following our training session we were back on the road and heading towards Manchester City's Eastlands Stadium where we would view the ground and layout our kit. As expected the Stadium was magnificent and I could see from the players' reaction that they were extremely excited by the prospect of playing there.

Following our stadium visit, we made our way to our hotel for dinner, followed by a team meeting and an early night ready for the next day.

On Saturday morning the staff and players had a pre-match meal and our final team preparation meeting before eventually checking out at around 12.15pm ready to leave for the Stadium for a 2pm kick-off.

By this time the lads were excited and obviously a bit nervous, but very keen to get the match underway, the full match report can be found under the 'Youth Team News' section or 'Match Reports'.

Ricky Martin
Academy Manager