AFC Bournemouth
Carl Fletcher gave credit his side as they finished their season on a cup-winning high with a 4-2 EFL Youth Alliance Cup final win away at Wigan Athletic.
The match displayed the Cherries’ fluid style and attacking flair, but also a stubbornness at the back and an ability to alter the flow of the game, in which Wigan started the better.
Nathan Randell had given the Latics an early lead before Kyle Taylor scored the first of two mesmeric solo goals, with Antonio Diaz and Nnamdi Ofoborh also on target for the visitors at the DW Stadium.
Coach Fletcher told afcb.co.uk that he was pleased with the way his players had changed the pattern of the game after a slow start.
“They will learn from this game, after the first 15 or 20 minutes when they seemed a bit nervous. They grew into the game and started to impose our style on their game, which is what we wanted to do.
“Their goal almost did us a favour and let us feel that we had nothing to lose,” he said. “We’d worked on what we wanted to do but weren’t fully committing to it.
“We needed to be more aggressive and the good thing for me is that they were able to do that themselves on the pitch.
“I emphasised before the game that I wanted players who can deal with the pressure and perform in the big games.
“I’m really pleased for the lads, they’re a young group with a lot of first years and under-16s playing tonight.
“With the journey that they’ve been on it’s fitting that it should end with winning the cup.”
Man-of-the-match Taylor started the ball rolling with his virtuoso goal, and Fletcher was delighted to see the blossoming of potential in the midfielder’s game.
“Kyle’s got that in his locker and he’s been on a long journey in the last two years from when he came in as a scholar,” said the coach.
“From where he was then to where he is now is unbelievable. He’s worked hard, matured and you could even see in the game that he’s trying to help the others out.
“The first goal was fantastic but I was really pleased with the second goal as well as we saw lots of the little movements we work towards on a daily basis and to finish that off with a goal was great.
“We had to stand up to the test because Wigan are a good side with some big physical players. They’re well organised and from all the videos we’ve seen we knew it would be a test.”
With the journey that they've been on it's fitting that it should end with winning the cup.
