The Bristol Rovers Supporters Club-sponsored U18’s suffered a narrow defeat on Saturday afternoon, as AFC Bournemouth ended their four-game unbeaten streak in the EFL Youth Alliance.
A robust performance from the Rovers U18s almost produced a result against AFC Bournemouth – as they lost out to a narrow one-goal margin at Yate Town.
“On Saturday we hosted a Bournemouth side unbeaten in their last 14 league games and who had secured their spot in the 4th round of the FA Youth Cup on Wednesday night with a 2-1 win over Mansfield Town,” details Tom Parrinello.
“Bournemouth would provide a stern test to our own mini unbeaten run of 4 games. They are technically very good in all areas of the pitch and have the ability to really take teams apart with their style of play.
“It turned out to be a game of real high quality. All the things we said about last week’s game against Forest Green being scrappy and a poor watch, this was completely opposite affair.
“Both teams played some excellent attacking football and there were some real glimpses of quality from both teams, and from our end some really good positive performances from individuals.
“As always against Bournemouth you have to be as good without the ball as with it, and in fairness to the players we had a game plan which they executed near enough perfectly, with the decisive goal coming from yet again a set piece this time from a second phase.
“Apart from that we restricted them to long range strikes and caused them countless problems with the high pressing game we deployed. We missed a number of really good chances which on another day we score, with the opposition goalkeeper pulling off a couple of wonderful saves.
“The intensity and tempo the boys displayed both in and out of possession was what we were after and overall the players should feel extremely unlucky not to come away with a point at the very, because their performance merited that.
“As previously mentioned there were lots of positives to take from the game despite the result in terms of the team performance which was everything we had asked of them as well as individual performances, and in particular Luc Noble and Jamie Bremner who were excellent at centre back and Lucas Tomlinson who is looking sharper and sharper with every minute he is on the pitch.”
Rovers: Harry Thomas-Barker, Scott Isherwood (c), Luca Hoole, Mason Raymond, Luc Noble, Jamie Bremner, Ollie Hulbert, George Fowler, Harry Warwick, Lucas Tomlinson, Zain Walker
Subs: Kieran Phillips, Graeme Anderson, Sam Heal, Joe Budd, Kinsley Murray.