Interview

‘Tyreece can play in numerous positions'

John-Jules

Steve Bould hailed Tyreece John-Jules’s versatility after he struck a brace in our 2-1 win over Leicester on Saturday. 

After finding ourselves a goal down at half-time, the young forward scored twice in five second-half minutes to our under-23s’ unbeaten start to the season.

We spoke to Bould after the game and this is what he said:

on the performance… 

In the second half for 25 minutes the performance was very good, it was the sort of performance level that we’re looking for. The first half was extremely tough as they were very physical and they look like a proper under-23 team who play regularly. We weren’t great [in the first half] in all fairness and we changed the shape a little bit in the second half and we then looked better for 20-25 minutes and then it was tough again for the last 20 minutes, but we showed an awful lot of character and I thought within all of that there was some really good performances.

on his words at half-time… 

I told them really to compete more, it wasn’t really about them with the ball, with the ball we weren’t great but you have to earn a right sometimes. We looked a little bit on the back foot and we thought that maybe with changing to a three at the back would open one or two things up with Flo [Balogun] and Tyreece John-Jules playing together up top and in all fairness Tyreece, for the whole 90 minutes, played well so he deserved his two goals and he’s just come back from England duty and he looks a good player. 

on the unbeaten run… 

It’s great for the kids, it’s fantastic, the longer that we can stay undefeated the better because it gives them a belief about actually playing. It’s not, and I reiterate this quite a lot, the result is great but the performance at this stage in their careers for me is more important and at times today we showed that level of performance that we’re all pleased with. 

on John-Jules’s versatility…

The kid can play, he can play as a nine or a 10, he can play central midfield and he just nods his head and gets on with it and enjoys his football. He’s a very good footballer, and he’s intelligent enough to play numerous positions and his first goal today was fabulous finish with his left foot. We’re all pleased for him, he works tremendously hard, doesn’t say too much and gets on with his football and today showed at what level he can perform at. 

By Sam Cox