Steve Spooner

A late second half goal saw Blues U18's fall to a slender 1-0 defeat away at Leicester at the weekend.

Striker Billy Kee fired home the only goal of the game for the Foxes with 70 minutes on the clock, after he found himself unmarked at the far post.

Although his Blues side put up a spirited performance against their older and more powerful opponents, Academy coach Steve Spooner admitted the defeat could have been heavier had it not been for performances of his centre backs and goalkeeper.

"It was a tenacious performance and a good team effort, but Leicester were a much older and physically stronger side," said Spooner.

"The 1-0 scoreline doesn't really reflect the game.

"Having said that we could have been 1-0 up ourselves in the first ten minutes.

"We started off very brightly and Dean Lea got through and lobbed the ball over their keeper, but their player has hooked it off line

Dean Lyness

"But then Leicester changed their shape and that caused us some real problems.

"We were far too eager to get forward and consequently we left gaping holes in midfield which they exploited and created numerous chances.

"We had a re-jig at half time but it didn't really stem the flow and we couldn't get anything going forward and the ball kept coming back.

"Eventually Leicester broke the deadlock and there was no way back for us."

Turning to his side's defensive performance Spooner said: "It was a fantastic performance by our goalkeeper, Dean Lyness.

"But the thing that really pleased me was the performances our two centre halves - Jacob Rowe and Dan Preston, who were outstanding, despite not having played together an awful lot."

Full time: Leicester U18's 1 Blues U18's 0

Blues U18's: Lyness, rutter, Timmins, Sammons (Newbury), Rowe, Preston, Hubbins, O'Brien, Jervis (Moses-Garvey), McPike, Lea.
Subs not used: None