Irow, Bloxham and Moore off the mark as Under-18s beat Brighton

Three goals in the last 11 minutes gave our Under-18s a solid home victory over Brighton & Hove Albion on Saturday.

With the two sides locked in stalemate for much of the contest, the points could well have been shared, but when striker Oliver Irow opened his account at this level on his first start of the season with 79 minutes gone, we never looked back, substitute Tom Bloxham and Mikey Moore subsequently adding their first goals of the campaign to round off a 3-0 win.

Brighton’s Remiero Moulton had their best chance mid-way through a largely uneventful first half when he collected Jaydon Fuller’s pass and fired wide from eight yards out, having earlier sent a dangerous ball across the face of goal from the left flank which wasn’t met by anyone in the middle.

Our central midfield duo of George Abbott and Han Willhoft-King, the latter making his first start since his return from injury, both found themselves on yellow cards inside the opening 16 minutes but we still managed the game well, growing into it and restricting the visitors largely to shots from distance.

The Seagulls wanted a penalty when Fuller went down in the box under Archie Chaplin’s challenge six minutes into the second period, but it was a fair one from the defender and the game remained goalless until substitute Tyrese Hall laid off for Irow to lash in from the left angle inside the box with 11 minutes remaining.

From there, we pressed home the advantage and Bloxham added his name to the scoresheet when his shot from the edge of the box deflected off defender Layth Gulzar and looped home for 2-0 on 88 minutes.

The pick of the bunch arrived two minutes later as Under-16s player Moore took over, skipping away from four players before slotting a left-footed shot beyond goalkeeper Tommy Reid, wrapping up a good day’s work from Stuart Lewis’ young side.

Highlights on SPURSPLAY

‘We scored thanks to our intensity and purpose’

Coach Stuart said after the game: “The first half was probably fragmented for both teams but it’s important in those spells that your concentration is high and you do your job, you work as an individual and as a team to come through that, so once that happened I thought our quality and class really showed in the last 25 minutes. I thought the boys’ technical and physical levels looked really strong and there were some top individual moments that enabled us to get the win.

“The first goal was an excellent piece of play from Tyrese Hall to drive from midfield and it was a really composed and assured finish from Ollie, the second goal from Tom Bloxham, a really good piece of work from Mikey Moore and with the final goal, the intensity on our press to win the ball back was evident and then we scored from that with a top piece of play from Mikey. Our intensity in that second half to get after the ball was really impressive and we actually scored from that intensity and purpose, so that was pleasing. To get a clean sheet was important as well, so overall I felt we deserved the win.”