Our manager was pleased with the level of performance that our young side put in as we secured top spot in our Papa John’s Trophy group last night.
Ayoub Assal’s individual goal cancelled out Ronan Curtis’ opener for Portsmouth as we came away from Fratton Park with a well-earned draw in a game which we could’ve won on another day.
With progress to the last-32 sealed, Johnnie was quick to praise the players for their attitude and application after we made nine changes from the weekend.
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“I thought the performance was tremendous for a young team against a really experienced side,” he said. “We took the game to them, we had a really good shape about us and showed some great energy. From what I saw tonight I’m absolutely delighted. Some of the boys haven’t had many starts and in some cases that was their first start, I’m really pleased with them.
“We needed to be disciplined and press them in the right areas. I knew the pace we had on the counterattack along with the two boys up front would make us a handful on the break. It paid off in the end.”
Our equaliser was Assal’s fifth goal of the season so far, meaning he has already scored half the amount of goals as he notched up in the previous campaign.
It was a finish which pleased the gaffer, particularly as it came from a passage of play that our number 10 has been working hard on to improve.
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“It was a great goal. We’ve been speaking to him a lot about taking more shots on in and around the penalty area. We want him to be direct and get at defenders when he gets those opportunities in one against one situations. It’s a good job he scored, as his mate, big Kyle Hudlin, was waiting in the middle for a tap-in!”
PICS: Graham Hunt (Pro Sports Images)