Oldham Athletic U18 1-2 Burnley U18
Tanya Blakey

Latics gave what was possibly one of their best performances of the season against title-chasing Burnley.

With six schoolboys in the team, Latics stood up to a Burnley team that had nine 18 year olds in their first XI, and not only competed physically against them, but certainly in the second half played the more fluent and progressive football.

For half an hour, the game was a stalemate with chances few and far between and the young Latics frustrating Burnley at every opportunity, however, a couple of individual defensive mistakes towards the end of the first half saw Burnley go on 2-0 at the interval, something the Latics didn't deserve at all.

The half time team talk by the coaching staff was very positive and it was put across that if Latics managed to get the first goal of the second half, then they felt they would be in the ascendancy and this is exactly what happened when Ryan Brooke forced a defensive mistake and was brought down for a penalty kick.  He himself got up to smash the ball home to cut the deficit.

Latics were now on the front foot and began dominating the game from back to front. In the last fifteen to twenty minutes, Ryan Brooke twice had chances to equalise, Phillip McGrath had a shot kicked off the line and Latics had what looked like stonewall penalty shout turned down by a poor referee.  Burnley hung on to record the 2-1 victory, but Latics staff said if there was a way to lose a game, this was it!

Bearing in mind the ages of the Latics squad, the signs were very good for what might be a promising campaign next season.