Preston North End vs Peterborough United

THE ONE AND ONLY
ACADEMY REVIEW
SATURDAY 14TH AUGUST // SPRINGFIELDS
PP
PNE U19s 3
(SLATER 56, 80; HOLLAND-WILKINSON, 89)
SALFORD CITY U19s 5
(PEDRO, 30, 60; DACKERS, 52, 89; FINLEY, 74)
Preston North End U19s were beaten 5-3 in an eight-goal
thriller at Springfields as they kicked-off the 2021/22 season
against Salford City last Saturday.
The opening stages were extremely well contested, with both
teams looking to attack at every opportunity, but neither
getting a strong foothold on the game.
It was the visitors with the first real opportunity, a
devastating break down the right lead by Finn Bartram
resulted in what looked like it would be a tap in for Marcus
Dackers, but he just couldn’t get the ball out of his feet.
The hosts then had the best chance of the game in the
opening minutes when Jacob Holland-Wilkinson found his
way in on goal, but attempted a first-time effort which
trickled wide.
It was the visitors who took the lead on the half hour mark
though, a defence splitting ball saw Djavan Pedro through on
goal and he was able to slot it past Lombard into the bottom
right-hand corner.
The Lilywhites started the better of the two teams after
half-time, but the Ammies doubled their lead when a well
taken corner from Alfie Henderson found the lively Dackers,
who rose highest in the box and headed it in the right-hand
corner.
North End replied almost instantly through great work from
Josh Seary to get down the right-hand side before his cross
found Jacob Slater at the back post to tap home.
Before the home side could gain some momentum Salford
restored their two-goal cushion. The ball was fizzed into the
box and turned into the net by both the North End defender
and Salford striker as they both lunged for it.
Wilson added a fourth for the visitors, but again Slater gave
North End the hope of a lifeline as he fired home his second
of the match after good work from Holland-Wilkinson to set
him up.
The visitors sealed the win though with a fifth goal late on
before Holland-Wilkinson got on the score sheet to finish
the scoring thanks to a deflection wrong-footing the Salford
goalkeeper.
Speaking after the game, Academy manager Nick Harrison
was left disappointed by the result, but felt there were
positives to take from the opening game of the campaign.
“We’re really disappointed with the result, conceding five
goals,” he said. “In terms of the positives, we scored three
goals, I thought we created a number of chances with some
really good play and really if you’re scoring three goals you
would expect to win the game.
“We conceded five goals and at this level you’re going to
lose the game so yeah really disappointed in terms of the
goals we conceded, but really pleased with the chances we
created on the goals that we scored.”
PNE U19 line-up: Lombard, Seary (Mahaffy, 85), Lewis, Taylor
(Best, 80), Mfuni, Blanchard, Walbank, O’Neill, Holland-Wilkinson,
Cross-Adair, Slater.
Subs not used: Duggan, Kelly, Conroy.
58