Starting Lineup: Nathaniel Copping, Connor Crane, Max Crane, Harvey Green, Ollie Dowdeswell, Ewan Parlett, Liam Shaw, Jack McLeavy, Ollie Griggs (C), Stan Horne, Ollie Long
Bench: George Russell, Ashton Rayworth, Hano Hanwar, Joshua Shanks, Rajiv Forrester,

The U23s welcomed Grundisburgh to the Flannery Stadium, a side that included former Blues U18 manager, Matt Murphy, who was a late signing and started on the bench.

The U23s started the game with a high tempo and it didn’t take long before they broke the deadlock. A passing movement down the right flank which had started in their own half saw the final pass put EWAN PARLETT free. He made good ground, cutting in to the visitor’s penalty area before scoring with a left foot shot.
Within minutes Liam Shaw picked up the ball midway in the Grundisburgh half and threaded a pass between their defence into OLLIE LONG’S path who doubled the home side’s lead at the second attempt. Barely had the visitors kicked off than the same player added to the score. With half an hour of the 1st half remaining the U23s were in complete control and could have and probably should have doubled the score but composure in front of goal went missing. The visitor’s goal with 15minutes of the half left came very much against the run of play but served as a wake up call for the U23s who restored the 3 goal advantage when OLLIE LONG completed his hat-trick after he latched on to a long ball from the back and shot past the advancing Isaac Reid in the visitor’s goal. There was still time in the half for Nathaniel Copping in the home goal to make a very good save and maintain the three goal advantage.

Half Time: U23s 4 – 1 Grundisburgh

The second half started slowly with manager, Neil Smye, making several substitutions, one of whom, Ashton Rayworth, was unlucky not to score when he swivelled in the Grundisburgh penalty area only to see his shot rebound off the far post to safety. It was a measure of how much more even the game was that the U23’s fifth goal didn’t come until 30 minutes into the 2nd half. The scorer was again EWAN PARLETT who skipped through the Grundisburgh defence to score. ASHTON RAYWORTH did get on the scoresheet when he was in the right place to fire home a right wing cross. That should have been the end of the scoring but the U23s were caught shorthanded at the back which allowed a left wing cross to be turned over the line at the far post by an unmarked player.

Full Time: U23s 6 – 2 Grundisburgh

Next Saturday the U23s travel to Kirkley & Pakefield Reserves in the next round of the Senior Cup. They are unlikely to find them as defensively generous as today’s visitors and so need to be more clinical in converting the chances they get.