Our under-23s extended their unbeaten run to eight Premier League 2 fixtures on Friday night with a 1-1 draw against Swansea City - but Zech Medley wanted more.
Despite boasting the greater share of possession throughout, we failed to capitalise on our dominance and truly take control of the game, allowing the hosts to score from a set-piece routine.
We spoke to the 18-year-old after the game - and this is what he said:
on the team’s overall performance…
We started off in the first half-hour sharp with a few combinations and bits of play, but we just couldn’t find the end product. Then they got into the game a bit too easy and had a few set pieces and scored from one, which pushed us back a bit going into half-time. We spoke at half-time and said that we just need to go again and start sharper and I think we did that. We dominated the second half and we got the goal but just at the final push we couldn’t really get there in the end. It was a shame and we’re really disappointed, but we’re just going to brush it off and go again in the next game.
on why we couldn’t press on…
It’s tough, I think maybe we thought the game would be a bit easier again. We just needed to keep pushing on and going harder and finishing off the first half strong and going into the second half like we did today.
on what Freddie Ljungberg said at half-time…
Just to get on top of them, keep the ball a bit better and stay relaxed. He told us not to do anything too extra and to just keep playing, moving and shifting them around and spaces will open up like they did, and we did exploit them and open them up pretty well, so it’s just a shame that we couldn’t finish off our chances.
on Swansea pressing from the front…
We’ve found that a lot of teams do that, so we work on that in training so that going into the games we’re a bit more comfortable. It does sort of play into my strengths a bit as well, so I’m not too fussed when teams do come out because it leaves gaps in-behind for us to play into. It plays into our hands a little bit because it does help us to get forward.
on Gilmour’s deflected goal…
It was pretty lucky, so again we just need to take our chances and see off games like these.
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