Has anyone else seen the excellent article on pages 8 and 9 of the 'Sport on Sunday' supplement in today's Mail on Sunday ? A very interesting and informative article regarding the success of their Academy, and some of the top young players they have produced to date, such as Theo Walcott/Gareth Bale & Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain. They have a lot to be proud of, and are light years ahead of PFC in this respect. On this basis alone, it makes a Pompey fan like me very happy, and indeed proud of the fact that our young lads had not one, but two excellent wins over their kids yesterday. A 1-0 win in the Academy match, and a 2-1 victory for the under 16's. Even their Academy coach - Jason Dodd - said that Pompey's youngsters "wanted the win" more than his young players did. Very, very pleasing indeed............
Shoudn't that be phishing Pieking ?! I was actually being serious in what I said. If PFC can aspire to be even 25% as successful as SFC, in the growth of their Academy, they will have achieved something
Although, it has to be said that both young and old in Pompey have that same stiff neck from staring up the table! Fair play to your nippers. I don't think we will have any problem of desire when the grown-ups visit in December.
Lets call it another piece of football education Wd. No matter how much talent you have as a individual playing in a team, it comes down to everyone pulling together, its very much where our first team is at the moment. They play attractive football as a team (look at our goal scorers to see that) and when they have to dog it out against some teams they also adapt to that well BUT only because they still work together as a team. Our youngsters will learn from there defeats to your lads and realize you don't sit in the changing room at half time looking at certain people to change the game for you, its a team effort, whether your the under dog or in top spot. Respect to your lads for putting in that effort and hopefully they will learn that if they can perform like that one week, Then why not every week.
