The Cherries youth team take on Leicester City and Mansfield Town in a triangular pre-season tournament.

The AFC Bournemouth under-18s traveled to Leicester City's training base on Tuesday for a triangular tournament where they took on both the Foxes and Mansfield Town, both in 60-minute matches.

First up, Alan Connell's rotated side - which was short of a number of players training with the under-21s - took on the Stags, Aaron Roberts scoring as the sides drew 1-1 after the hour before winning a penalty shootout, Cherries 'keeper Joe Beasant making two saves to secure the win.

Connell gave his view of the opening game to afcb.co.uk: "As we found out in the FA Youth Cup last season, Mansfield are a very difficult opponent. We dominated the ball for the 60-minute game, created a lot of chances and moved the ball really well.

"However, one error at the back, one of the few times Mansfield got into the final third, and that scored them their goal right at the end.

"The shootout was a good experience for the boys, having that sort of pressure to deal with. The whole game was a good learning experience, being only 1-0 up and needing to get that second."

Following the Mansfield match the Cherries came up against Leicester, losing 3-1 in a tight game despite Euan Pollock's second goal of pre-season.

"I'd say it was a 50-50 game," said Connell. "There were spells where we were very good and there were spells when I thought Leicester were very good. It could have gone either way, we scored a lovely goal playing out from the back, which Euan finished off from a Brooklyn Genesini cross.

"We made an individual error to put them 2-1 up, there's still rustiness there at this stage of the season, but that's not a problem and their were good aspects in our play. 

"The boys have put a lot in over the last two or three weeks, there have been some encouraging signs and the Leicester game was a really good test for us.

"Playing the two teams meant they needed to adapt really well and they did that for both situations. It was a really good day and while there's still lots of work towards do I feel we're moving in the right direction."

The Cherries next continue their pre-season with a home match against Chelsea at Canford Arena on Saturday, with supporters welcome along for the 11am kick-off.