They can certainly be reluctant to send players to England matches. Usually claiming the little beggars are too tired to play against the world's finest national youth teams. But will happily send them off to Mexico or somewhere to play when they can engineer a break Howard Wilkinson played that game when he was at Leeds. Yet the players would be turning out for the reserves mid-week and Saturday on the training ground against the likes of Rotherham and Huddersfield in the Northern Intermediate League. When Wilkinson took over as the FA youth development guru he suddenly changed 180 degrees and decided playing the likes of Spain, Holland and France was a great idea after all.
Spurs have some promising looking English u17 players in classy right back Kyle Walker-Peters, striker Shayon Harrison and midfielder Anton Walkes.
I spotted Roberts touching the ball with his right foot last night. It was a bad one. And went out for a goal kick. He won't be risking that again in a hurry. (Fulham through to the final to face winners of Chelsea v Arsenal)
I would assume most everybody would fancy us and Holland to go through. I think everybody who qualified wanted to be in the same group with Malta, who to be fair, probably wouldn't have made it out of the qualifiers. Turkey is still a tough side though. We did beat them 1-0 in September in our tournament. The same age groups played in that memorable tournament in France almost a year ago with Turkey besting us 2-2 winning the shootout 4-2. However the Dutch and us have perfect qualifying records. I will not count the Germans because they didn't have to go through the qualifiers. Many people say it doesn't matter when you play the teams in your group categorically, but I believe it does matter. We play Malta first and they will have a huge crowd most likely. They are very excited for this event. I wish we could've played Holland first because its nice to have to start out playing strong and then play the lesser teams. However, we should beat Malta and have 3 points after day 1. Then we will probably just need to get a tie from either Turkey or Holland and we should be in the semifinals, but we can defiantly win this group I believe. It would be extra special if we played Scotland, however it would be extra extra special for them too. Bottom line it would be a disappointment if we didn't make it out of this group with the talent we have. BTW if you make it out of your group does that mean you qualify for the FIFA U-17 World Cup or do you have to win it all? 3 of the 4 teams in the FA International Tournament made it to the championships: England, Portugal, & Turkey.
For Group B I don't see Scotland getting out of there. Germany is too powerful and Switzerland are extremely battled tested from making it out their Elite Round with having to deal with Spain. Portugal are also much more talented side. Either one of those 3 are capable of finishing at the top of the group.
UEFA say all matches will be on Eurosport International or Eurosport 2. www.uefa.com/under17/news/newsid=2090630.html
FA Youth Cup second leg between chelsea and arsenal about to kick off on ITV4. Crowley on the bench and a host of England youth internationals are starting
Chelsea look a much more cultured side. You can tell they've invested in the right coaches and practises.
The game could have done with a couple of decent goals. Arsenal seem to have a sparring partner mentality (as in the first leg) with little attacking intent. Maybe Brown being on the bench will gee him up a bit - for when it really counts for England. I'll be interested to see if Dasilva turns into a pocket rocket type player in a couple of years. And the hit and miss Kiwomya has started to put the peddle down a bit more when running.
Bits of selection news for the U17 is coming out on Twitter. Seen Dael Fry and Taylor Moore confirm they've been picked for the Euro finals.
No Crowley. Squad - Goalkeepers: Freddie Woodman (Newcastle United), Sam Howes (West Ham United) Defenders: Jonjoe Kenny (Everton), Mandela Egbo (Everton), Dael Fry (Middlesbrough), Taylor Moore (RC Lens), Joe Gomez (Charlton Athletic), Tafari Moore (Arsenal) Midfielders: Lewis Cook (Leeds United), Ryan Ledson (Everton), Joshua Onomah (Tottenham Hotspur), Callum Cooke (Middlesbrough), Josh Sims (Southampton) Forwards: Demetri Mitchell (Manchester United), Patrick Roberts (Fulham), Dominic Solanke (Chelsea), Adam Armstrong (Newcastle United), Isaiah Brown (Chelsea) Read more at http://www.thefa.com/news/england/d...mpionship-in-malta-230414#d3gdXpAGvVpVxgrq.99
That squad is capable of winning the tournament. No Crowley is a miss though. (Given that he's available for Ireland, might not have been the wisest move to leave him out of the tournament!)
This squad isn't that surprising to be honest. I wasn't expecting Peacock to change it much from the previous squad.