Focus is on the under-18s this weekend
It’s an international break so there is no game for the first team and the under-23s don’t play until Monday which means all the focus this weekend will be on the under-18 team who will hopefully be back in action against Bolton Wanderers at Gawthorpe tomorrow morning.
Having lost the first two games, Tony Philliskirk’s team have fought back with three league wins in the last four, the most recent of them coming three weeks ago at Wigan. Three days after the Wigan win, we beat Oldham 4-1 at home in the Lancashire Youth Cup although, in fairness, the scoreline was a bit harsh on Oldham.
The home game against Barnsley was scheduled for two weeks ago but fell victim to the weather and will now be played in December. We had a free week last week and that inactivity has seen us drop from third to seventh in the northern group of the U18 Professional Development League.
Tomorrow gives us the opportunity to start moving back up the table with all of the other teams having played more games than us, and that opportunity comes against bottom of the league Bolton.
Unlike their first team and under-23s, Bolton’s under-18s have won one game this season of the seven they’ve played. They beat QPR, who sit bottom of the south group, 4-2 in mid-September and more recently they added a four point from a 1-1 home draw against Birmingham.
Two seasons ago, this fixture ended in a 1-0 win for Bolton, an undeserved defeat for us that brought an end to a seven game unbeaten league run. Last season, having beaten them 3-2 with a Michael Fowler hat trick in the Lancashire Youth Cup, we were beaten once more in the home league game by the same 3-2 scoreline with Mitch George (pictured) and Fowler scoring our goals.
Kick off tomorrow at Gawthorpe is 11 a.m.
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