Northwood U18 2  Tring Athletic U18 5

Wednesday 16th August 2023

NORTHWOOD
1	Matteo Chianca
2	James Payne (sub off)
3	Jeremy Scholz
4	Oliver Pope
5	Liam Osborne (sub off)
6	Ethan Bradford ©
7	Alex Grant
8	Nicholas Casteluber
9	Fabjan Toci
10	Tom Reid
11	Ben Crowder
Substitutes
12	Joe Booth (sub on)
14	Keelan Sweeney (sub on)
15	Brian McGovern (sub on)
16	-
17	-

Ryan Young’s Under 18 side kicked-off their new campaign with a home game against Tring Athletic in the Extra Preliminary Round of the FA Youth Cup.

Pre-season had gone pretty well with wins over Dunstable Town (6-1) and Leverstock Green (2-1) before a narrow 3-4 defeat against a strong Walton & Hersham side, so there was some confidence going into the cup fixture at the Skyline Roofing Stadium.

However, with plenty of the playing squad still away on their holidays, the Woods could only name 14 players for the game (out of a possible 18) and the visitors, who are run by Pro-Sport Academy, looked tough opponents.

And, so it proved as, after a cagey start, Tring settled down and were soon two goals ahead. The Woods then rallied well towards the end of the first-half. Firstly, a corner saw Jeremy Scholz head home at the near-post and soon after, last season’s top scorer Fabjan Toci swept home an Alex Grant cross to level things up.

Losing James Payne to injury at half-time was a bit of a blow for the Woods though and Athletic were back in front just three minutes into the second-half. The Woods battled hard but when Tring were awarded a penalty in the 75th minute which they scored from it was pretty much game over and they added another penalty deep into stoppage-time to wrap up a 5-2 success.

Report by ALAN EVANS