Lafferty, Dorrans, Whittaker and Rudd all feature in victory
NORWICH City Under-21s called upon first-teamers Kyle Lafferty, Graham Dorrans, Steven Whittaker and Declan Rudd as they defeated Manchester United 2-0 on Monday evening.Dmitri Halajko refelcted on a result that saw his side halt a run of six straight defeats, with Lafferty and Jamar Loza netting in a comfortable victory for the Canaries.
"We were the slightly better team and deserved the win; the key thing was to make ourselves more solid which we did in the first half and capitalised on that in the second," said the Development Squad manager.
"Our young guys will have learnt a lot from playing alongside the senior pros so that's only going to ever be a positive."
"We carried out our gameplan well, and the games at Carrow Road have often brought about our best performances and results so we look forward to more."
Declan Rudd made a stunning save to deny Axel Tuanzebe from close range after a corner had broken lose in the City penalty area in an evenly contested first half.
City managed to break the deadlock 12 minutes after the restart, when Kyle Lafferty superbly lifted the ball over the head of Sam Johnstone and into the top corner of the net.
Jamar Loza had a chance to double that lead soon after, but Johnstone thwarted the young Jamaican forward when he was through one-on-one.
Loza made amends with 15 minutes to go however, as he took full advantage of a similar chance to bury the ball low past Johnstone to double City's advantage.
Late defensive resilience ensured that the Canaries held onto a clean sheet as well as the three points, with textbook defending securing a priceless victory.
FULL-TIME: Norwich City 2-0 Manchester United
NORWICH CITY: Rudd; Hall-Johnson (c) (Middleton, 80), Efete, Crowe, Whittaker; McGrandles, Dorrans; Loza, King, Eaton-Collins (Lewis, 88); Lafferty (Uade, 69). Unused subs: Killip (GK), Grant.