Academy League Group A winners Arsenal begin the defence of their title tomorrow morning as The Under 18 season gets under way at home to Everton.
The start to the new campaign begins with a tinge of sadness as Youth Development Officer Liam Brady remains in hospital, and we will not be watching over the young Gunners tomorrow. Three points against a competitive Everton side would surely be dedicated to the Irish legend.
The Academy season always begins earlier than the Reserves, meaning Steve Bould can call upon a batch of players not normally available, with the importance of a strong start strengthened with many of the newly signed professionals.
International duty claims two certain participants, as Rui Fonte and Conor Henderson only arrived back in London this morning following a tournament in Ireland. Anton Blackwood (Injury) and Oğuzhan Özyakup (Personal Reasons) are rated at 50:50, whilst fellow new boy Ignasi Miquel is ineligible.
Francis Coquelin has shaken off a thigh problem to start, and came through a training game with Gilles Sunu in midweek. James Shea will become Under 18 number one as the season progresses, but until the Reserves kick their year off – Wojciech Szczesny is expected to keep his place.
Szczesny
Eastmond – Bartley (c) – Ayling – Cruise
Lansbury – Frimpong – Coquelin – Watt
Murphy – Sunu
New scholars Rhema Obed, Oliver Nicholas, Rorie Deacon, Sam Byles and Luke Freeman will all be competing for a place on the bench, along with promoted school boys Jason Banton and Benik Afobe.
Everton have had several starlets on first team Premier League duty recently, and Under 18 coach Ray Hall admits he is excited about playing the Gunners, but had a slight dig at Arsenal’s foreign talents.
“When you start the season against a club with a big tradition with young players as arsenal do, it makes it all the more exciting.”
“It’s one of the few fixtures where we take the lads down their on Friday and we stay overnight, so it’s giving the boys a flavour of what it would be like if they were in and around the first team.
“A number of the boys will be foreign, so it will be a local flavour against a foreign flavour.”
Kick off tomorrow is at 11am UK time, with the encounter taking place at our Shenley based Colney training ground. Games are free to get in, although should you not make the fixture – Young Guns will have a full report shortly after full time.
Article By – J.Sanderson
why is lansbur on the wing i thought he was a DM
JS, does than mean anybody can turn up at the training ground watch these matches on Saturday mornings??
I thought the training ground was kept away from the public….
He is, but with the amount of Central midfielders here Henri has been pushed outwide in recent months.
nice one J. whats ur first name by the way?
TopGunPires – Yep you can, if you live near the training centre you can go and watch, it’s at first team training sessions you can’t go, but for U18 fixtures you are allowed in.
“if you live near the training centre you can go and watch”
Cool, any rules on photos or videos while there?
Ride it like you stole it
Tom Cruise is now a left back?
is that due to wenger devoloping lansbury to be more beratile and being eased back after a long layoff or is it due to him falling down the pecking oreder
whilst fellow new boy Ignasi Miquel is ineligible.
—
Why’s this J?
Tom Cruise is now a left back?
Arse&Nose said this on August 22, 2008 at 1:58 pm
Anything to stop him going the way of Isaac Hayes.
whos better j Baxter or wilshere
Do they happen to show the games on ArsenalTV? Cheers for the update (Y)
Jay, would you agree this is the strongest under 18’s team we’ve had since Wenger arrived? And do you think Afobe will see much playing time?
Sweet, hopefully Coquelin will get a good 90 mins under his belt. Looks like a very strong team though in all fairness.
Isaac Hayes RIP
chef didnt mind taking the micky out of every religion, race and creed but when it came to Scientology being joked about he couldn’t take it!
J Where do they train. Next to the Watford training ground?
That is easy to see, I have never seen the Arsenal one, and that is 15 mins away from me
Samuel – He does not become eligible to play until his 16th Birthday.
Claude – Maybe, every year it seems to get better, but i think last years was our best with Wilshere, Thomas and Barazite.
Dave Dragon – I believe you can take photo’s, but no videos.
Le Coq!!! :D
Wilshere is a better player than baxter although they play in different positions you can tell that Wilshere is almost good enough for first team at arsenal whereas baxter is only drafted into everton’s first team because of injuries and the size of their squad but i believe jack rodwell is a very good player that everton have produced
Wilshire is better than Baxter. I’ve never like the look of Baxter – he’s no Rhys Murphy, but to be fair he’s done well in pre-season.
To the chap who was on about taking his video camera it’s usually a no-no I’ve seen signs up elsewhere about it.
Frimpong and Coquelin in the centre of the park not much will get past as both are powerful players we’ll be looking to the wings for creativity
Frimpong + Coquelin are class holding players, but neither a true ( Fabregas, Denilson, Merida ) playmaker ! A danger of there being a huge space between the middle two + the front two ? – just like the French side at Euro 2008 !! remember how they failed so poorly to play the beautiful game that they once so gloriously espoused in ’78,’82,’84, ’86 ? Didn’t we sign Fabregas + Merida aged 16 ? Oh please Arsene, go find another one !
I was thinking about Pompey. They now have 6 players in their squad that have previously played for us.
Campbell
Lauren
Diarra
Thomas
Kanu
Traore
Finally the Youth season is here, can´t wait. We will take this Everton team and spank them. Easy on calling us foreing though, there are 3 foreigners in the expected starting line-up.
Cruise has played left back before. Hes ok there, more suited to centre back but he can do a job at Left back and probably right back too if u ask me, not to mention the centre of midfield.
Exited about the game, cnt wait to watch the highlights on Arsenal.com and read the report here. Line-up looks good. Im most looking forward to seeing some of the U16 players breal the U18s though this season.
Unless Frimpong is Ghanaian or Nigerian, I count only 3 lads that aren’t from these isles in the above line-up, so what the Everton turd is talking about with his “foreign flavour” nonsense is beyond me.
Making us out to be a foreign team is such an easy dig for no-mark, thick Brits and it’s frankly tiring. But, as much as they may joke, England haven’t looked like winning a tournament in well over a decade such is the paucity of talent. Under these circumstances, I’d rather have class foreign lads like Cesc, Clichy and Barazite playing my youth set-up than plonkers like James Vaughan, Frazier Campbell and all the other gash players in the U-19s / U-21s.
It will be a very very very tough game against the Everton U18’s team tomorrow because they have some quality young players at that particular club IMO
The likes of Rui Fonte, Gavin Hoyte, Paul Rodgers, Abu Ogogo, Kieran Gibbs and Rene Steer as well as goalkeeper Wojciech Szczesny are all now 18 or over and therefore inelligible.
liam brady got released from hospital
Premier League rules say we can use an Under 19 keeper.