HUFC Youth lose out to Bristol in FA Cup

Hereford United Youth tumbled out of their FA Cup competition yesterday evening at Edgar Street, beaten 2-0 by a Bristol Rovers X1 that just had that little bit extra in most departments. The game, watched by around 180 supporters was keenly contested with the Bristol boys showing from early on that they were likely to shade the match. In particular, their wide right player Fabian McCarthey was proving to be a reliable outlet for them. His first touch and awareness was impressive. However, the young Bulls did show a good determination in a game that was played at a surprisingly quick pace and had their share of possession without creating many scoring chances. Bristol took the lead in about the 35th minute when a deep cross from the right was headed away only to fall to the unmarked Adam Mahdi on the edge of the Bulls penalty area. Mahdi made no mistake firing low and hard into the corner of the net. Just before the end of the half, the Bulls created their best chance when a ball was played in from wide right to the near post. It was met by the advancing Tom Harding whose effort was blocked by a defender at the expense of a corner. Bristol's second goal came on the hour following a foul given away by the under pressure Bulls defence 25 yards from goal. The resulting Charles Reece free kick was curled over the wall and into the goal off the upright. The young Bulls did have a period after this when they managed to exert some pressure on the Rovers defence. Craig Jones delivered a wicked left footed cross from the right which a Bristol defender was relieved to deflect for a corner and on 70 minutes, a storming drive forward by central defender Scott Walker saw him eventually felled on the edge of the box. As the game finished, the Bristol boys again assumed control and played out for what was a fairly comfortable win which takes them to the next round where they meet Millwall.

Afterwards, I spoke to both Gary Stevens and Colin Williams who are responsible for the squad which is based at Pershore College. Neither was overly disappointed and offered good reasons for the apparent discrepancy in the teams and were optimistic about the future. Williams explained that the Bulls youngsters were essentially a group of local boys who had come through the HFA school or had returned from brief periods at other League clubs academy's whereas the Bristol squad was more of a "cherry picked" team who had spent much more time together. Gary Stevens made the very valid point that the opposition would have started their season probably as early as mid July with pre-season work and were full time whereas the Hereford lads did not get together until much later when college started in September. "Our lads are on a full time course of education and we only get them on their own for literally a few hours a week. At other times they can be training with students of very mixed ability including girls who are studying at Pershore. However, most of them are still young and will stay with us next year so the experience of games like tonight will do them no harm at all. Ideally, we would like to see the club with a proper youth set-up of its own. There is talk of funding being available for next season so we live in hope that over a few years we will be able to produce a couple more like Andy Williams."

Note. Sorry for the delay with the report, ISP down at home! Ex.

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