Sam Tillen praised his side for an all-round performance against Rochdale on Saturday.
After a first loss of the season against Wrexham, the young Imps rallied and emerged as 9-0 victors over Rochdale in their latest Youth Alliance North fixture.
City found themselves five goals to the good at the break, through a Leo Fifield brace as well goals from Josh Kennealey, Gael Mande and Mason Jubb. The pressure didn’t relent in the second half with Fifield netting a further two, Josh Kennealey getting another to complete a brace and the afternoon was finished off by a goal from Tariro Darikwa.
Tillen spoke after the impressive performance and was particularly pleased with the way his side continued the persistent pressure throughout the duration of the game and how he was happy to also keep the clean sheet after conceding late on in last month’s 10-1 success over York City.
He said: “It’s very pleasing, especially with the clean sheet, we had a previous game against York where we conceded late on. We managed to keep our focus well today and we created a number of chances to score and managed to come away with nine.
“All in all, it was an incredibly positive performance and to come away unscathed without any injuries is an added bonus and good preparation for the game against Hull on Tuesday.”
Amongst the first-half scorers was young midfielder, Mason Jubb who had an impressive display in the middle of park. Tillen spoke about his strengths and importance to the team whilst also highlighting the impressive performances from his whole squad.
Tillen said: “Mason is a very intelligent footballer, and he makes good movements and creates good opportunities for players to play through the lines and go over the top, so I was really pleased for him personally that he managed to get on the scoresheet.
“It was a good performance by everyone, I thought everybody was focused and everybody was relentless in their play, with a five-goal lead at half time it can sometimes be difficult to continue with the same intensity but the mentality was brilliant and to score four more and not concede in that second period is a huge positive.”
Next up is the second of the young Imps’ three U17 PDL Cup group games - the first of those ended in success over Mansfield Town. City now travel away from home to face tough opposition in Hull City and Tillen spoke ahead of the clash with the Tigers.
He said: “We’ll get the lads back on Monday, as I’ve already touched on it was great to come out of this game with no injuries whilst also managing to get a lot of minutes into the players.
“We’ll look to Hull and prepare the best we can physically and tactically, and we know they’ll obviously present a very tough challenge but we’re looking forward to it and hopefully we can build on this success.”