The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

[the other bob wilson]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

The under-21s are back in action tomorrow night (Tuesday) against Watford at Leckwith Stadium, 7.00 kick off.

No Mafico, Giles, Spiers or Perrett (he's third top scorer in the league for now) but there should be enough strength in depth to be competitive for the rest of the season.

Interesting to see if we give Michael Reindorf a run-out tomorrow and if we give Axel Donczew more game time at that level as the season goes on.

Wonder why it's an evening kick off? Is it another one of those Premier league Cup games?

I was wondering when we were going to play in the FA Youth Cup this season as I'd seen nothing about it up to now. I looked on this

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025–26_FA_Youth_Cup

to try and find out and was beginning to think there'd been another "auditor's" cock up and we'd not been entered into the competition until I looked at the First Round and saw we lost 1-0 at home to Cheltenham on the day after I'd been admitted to hospital, so that explains why I'd not heard anything about it. i daresay it was a result that City must have been keen to keep quiet about because it's so embarrassing for a club that is having so many complimentary things said about it's youth development currently.

[Loramski]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

Wonder why it's an evening kick off? Is it another one of those Premier league Cup games?

I was wondering when we were going to play in the FA Youth Cup this season as I'd seen nothing about it up to now. I looked on this

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025–26_FA_Youth_Cup

to try and find out and was beginning to think there'd been another "auditor's" cock up and we'd not been entered into the competition until I looked at the First Round and saw we lost 1-0 at home to Cheltenham on the day after I'd been admitted to hospital, so that explains why I'd not heard anything about it. i daresay it was a result that City must have been keen to keep quiet about because it's so embarrassing for a club that is having so many complimentary things said about it's youth development currently.

I'm not sure there's a conspiracy theory about the club keeping it quiet. It was the night of the Wrexham cup-tie so it got overshadowed by that.

I saw the first half and posted about it on here. Cheltenham had an interesting tactic where they tried to stop us playing out down the wings and when it came inside they jumped on Hayden Allmark who couldn't cope with it. One time, Rob Tankiewicz (making his first appearance of the season at u-18 level) had to come racing back to try and bail him out but went down in a collision and broke his collar bone.

It was a poor performance from what I saw, we couldn't get anything going at all. I did say at the time that it seemed a bit hard on the lads to get a home tie then play it while the first team were on national television. Only 132 turned up to watch and a majority of them seemed to be from Cheltenham.

[City123]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

The under-21s are back in action tomorrow night (Tuesday) against Watford at Leckwith Stadium, 7.00 kick off.

No Mafico, Giles, Spiers or Perrett (he's third top scorer in the league for now) but there should be enough strength in depth to be competitive for the rest of the season.

Interesting to see if we give Michael Reindorf a run-out tomorrow and if we give Axel Donczew more game time at that level as the season goes on.

Will be very interesting to see the team

Mafico, Giles, Spiers, Perrett and Nyakuhwa now all gone. I don't see the point persisting with Reindorf.

[Loramski]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

Will be very interesting to see the team

Mafico, Giles, Spiers, Perrett and Nyakuhwa now all gone. I don't see the point persisting with Reindorf.

Strong enough team but no Reindorf. No Donczew either but it's probably past his bedtime to be fair.

[the other bob wilson]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

Duw, this is a poor game.

Watford get a deserved lead on the basis that they’ve been slightly less bad than us. Just like the seniors on Saturday, City’s under 21s have seemingly forgotten how to pass the ball accurately.

[Loramski]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

Duw, this is a poor game.

Watford get a deserved lead on the basis that they’ve been slightly less bad than us. Just like the seniors on Saturday, City’s under 21s have seemingly forgotten how to pass the ball accurately.

It's not the best back 4 for passing out from the back and we're getting in trouble when we try so Griffiths is having to kick it long more often than not. We've got in a couple of decent positions and Pearce is looking lively again but it's not great, I agree.

Reindorf is here watching by the way. He seems to be limping which might explain why he dropped out of the picture so suddenly at Newport.

[City123]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

Strong enough team but no Reindorf. No Donczew either but it's probably past his bedtime to be fair.

3 subs seems strange

[the other bob wilson]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

2-0 to Watford now.

[the other bob wilson]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

Superb finish from over twenty yards by Trey George makes it 1-2.

[Loramski]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

Bizarre finish. 3-1 down in the 89th minute then Dan Ola finishes our best move of the night to make it 3-2. Seconds later, the ball breaks to Luke Pearce who holds it up on the by-line till Ola gets into the box and rolls it to him but Ola's shot is blocked and Watford break away and score.

Barton then thought he'd won a penalty but the ref didn't give it and Watford broke away again and made it 5-2 when it could've been 3-3 a couple of minutes earlier.

Watford deserved the win but we showed plenty of spirit and played better football with an attacking 4-4-2 set up although it left the back four completely exposed at times.

[the other bob wilson]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

Bizarre finish. 3-1 down in the 89th minute then Dan Ola finishes our best move of the night to make it 3-2. Seconds later, the ball breaks to Luke Pearce who holds it up on the by-line till Ola gets into the box and rolls it to him but Ola's shot is blocked and Watford break away and score.

Barton then thought he'd won a penalty but the ref didn't give it and Watford broke away again and made it 5-2 when it could've been 3-3 a couple of minutes earlier.

Watford deserved the win but we showed plenty of spirit and played better football with an attacking 4-4-2 set up although it left the back four completely exposed at times.

5-2 was harsh on City, but they were definitely second best in a game which never deserved to have seven goals in it. Thought Jake Davies showed up well at times and it was a great goal by George, but, overall, City really did miss the loaned out players, Also, where were the likes of Apter, Dabono (who was interviewed about the game on the club website) and Jac Thomas? Thought Parfitt was the best of the defenders, but they all were struggling to some extent even before the switch to 4-4-2.

[Loramski]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

5-2 was harsh on City, but they were definitely second best in a game which never deserved to have seven goals in it. Thought Jake Davies showed up well at times and it was a great goal by George, but, overall, City really did miss the loaned out players, Also, where were the likes of Apter, Dabono (who was interviewed about the game on the club website) and Jac Thomas? Thought Parfitt was the best of the defenders, but they all were struggling to some extent even before the switch to 4-4-2.

Jac Thomas came in with Reindorf, it was odd about Debono but he was out for a month or so before Xmas and no idea about Apter. Maybe one or two of them pulled out late which would explain why we only had three subs, as City123 pointed out.

I like Parfitt but he's a bit limited as a full back, there was no one to link the back four to the front six. BBM has spoiled us a bit in that regard but it was very unusual to see it at that level.

The last half hour or so was entertaining to be fair. I don't think Warnock would see Twose and George as a midfield two but they did a good job in making us more of an attacking threat. Barton started to get in the game more and Pearce never stopped but when we lost the ball Watford were excellent on the counter attack.

[City123]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

Ex academy striker James Crole has joined Newport

Surprised he never really got a chance with us

[Loramski]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

Ex academy striker James Crole has joined Newport

Surprised he never really got a chance with us

Hard to know what to make of his time here. I was surprised to find he's still only 21, it was over three years ago he was scoring a good goal in our pre-season win over Newport and he was looking the part.

I'm not sure what wrong for him but there was a very brief loan to Torquay, the goals started drying up, Wales age-group stuff stopped and, although Bulut gave him a run out at Blackburn, his time here just petered out, finishing with another non-event of a loan, to Queens Park.

The fact he went to Penybont suggests he wasn't exactly in demand. Even if there was an attitude problem you'd have thought a league club might have taken a chance on him but any reputation he'd built up at 17/18 must have evaporated.

There's probably a backstory but I don't know what it is. Whatever went wrong, it looks like the penny has dropped for him now and his good form has earned him a two and a half year contract at Newport. It'll be interesting to see how it goes for him there. Nyakuhwa too, of course.

[the other bob wilson]

Re: The Bluebirds Academy and DVP thread...

If such stats were kept, I reckon they may well show James Crole to be our most consistent scorer in terms of games per goal amon g the strikers who've played for us at below first team level (in particular under 18 and under 21 levels). I was surprised when he made so little impact during his loans while with us and wasn't there a fruitless spell at Colchester as well after he left us?

I hope I'm proved wrong, but I've found County's January transfer dealings fairly underwhelming so far - not sure Nyakuhwa is a player for a Fourth Division relegation scrap and loaning someone who couldn't get in the Shrewsbury side is hardly one to set the pulses racing. Crole's an interesting one though, particularly when you consider that two and a half year contract which they've given him. County clearly see him as part of the club's future and you'd hope that, like one or two other of their signings from the Welsh Premier League, he can make the step up to EFL football, now he's got a bit more experience of doing well in senior football.