Seen this on Twitter. Was looking at Saints-related tweets and found one of the academy guys posting pictures of the trophy etc. Anyway. Saints U15s went to compete in the Iber Cup in Portugal, a 6 day tournament that started on July the 1st. They won their age group, which included: please log in to view this image Congratulations to them, some great results in there. If you want to read more or see scores etc, here is the website: http://www.ibercup.com/en/ DTLW
I believe at least part of the Leihberr's 50 million has been allocated to the construction of a large trophy cabinet
They won a lot at the end but terrible the first few days. Makes me think they won the lesser half of the tournament...
Worth pointing out that they won the plate, not the actual trophy. They finished third in their group and then strode to victory in the plate winning 4-0, 3-0, 3-0 and 5-1 in the final. Good find though mate, always glad to see one of our academy teams doing well!
Correction.... They finished 3rd in their initial group. As spacedsaints suggests, they won the tournament for teams who did not qualify from the group. FFS lads. Someone tell Les before he gets to IKEA.
To be fair to boys, they had the tournament winners in their group and the other team to beat them were knocked out in the quarter-finals by the eventual runners-up so not as bad as it first sounded!
So they were best... of the rest..! At their age, I believe the current thinking is not to place too much importance on winning. Or, at 15, have we entered that category now..?
On the other hand, judging by the website it looks like one of the top tournaments around for that age group, so "best of the rest" is still pretty good.
It is also used as experience for the kids, the goal is not to win the cup (would be nice though). I believe we fielded two teams and I`m sure that the players were mixed and matched after each game to expose them to different positions and players. Alot of teams enter these tounaments with only the desire to win so play thier best 11 as it looks good for thier acadamy, yet the kids on the fringe never get a look in. Still pretty good result though, shame they vcan not have a beer to celebrate.
English team does well in tournament against the much heralded Spanish/Portuguese/South American 'tekkers' coached sides. I think this is definitely to be applauded.
Does anyone know the names of the players in the team? One of my managers has a son that would be around the age to have gone and played, although I haven't seen her mention it.
An update lifted off Saintsweb from a parent who was there. We played mainly our U14s with only a couple of U15s. The Spanish and Portuguese sides were miles ahead in quality of play, though the winning side was actually an invitational side selected from the best players in 4 Academies. We played and won easily the plate for teams finishing 3rd in their group. Apparently it was good experience and enjoyed by all. He also mentioned Cascais as a good holiday venue...have been thinking about that as it is near Lisbon (my favourite city).
Agree with that. Went to Cascais three years ago, real nice area, and so is Estoril which is about five minutes away. Easy to get to Lisbon on the trains too, far cheaper than the trains we get in this country. Anyway, nice to see Saints doing well in youth cups, especially against teams from abroad. Will only help their development further, and our scouts could be there to spot any talent worth taking.
