Our Under-18s suffered a late collapse after the dismissal of Samal Bangura to crash to a 4-2 defeat at Southampton on Saturday lunchtime.
Under pressure in the early going at Staplewood, we recovered from conceding after just 60 seconds to lead 2-1, Reiss Elliott-Parris scoring from the penalty spot before Armend Muslika bagged his fifth goal in five league games in the second period.
But a straight red card shown to substitute Bangura for appearing to lash out at an opponent in the 73rd minute left us with a battle on our hands and we were ultimately punished, conceding three times in the last five minutes as the hosts galloped to victory.
We made life difficult for ourselves from the off, the Saints needing just a minute to take the lead. A cross was knocked back across goal by Broghan Sewell, Cameron Thomas blocked it on the line but Jake Vallance was on hand to prod home the loose ball from close range.
Elijah Upson blocked well from Hansel Sdjei-Afriyie as Southampton continued to threaten but after finding himself largely frustrated in the attacking areas, Elliott-Parris got us back on level terms from the spot 10 minutes before the break after Thierry Rohart-Brown was penalised for a high boot on Leon Myrtaj in the box.
Muslika’s left angled shot glanced off the crossbar in the opening stages of the second half, but he wasn’t to be denied on 63 minutes as he latched onto the ball just outside the box and unleashed a fierce strike which took a big deflection off defender Vallance and sailed into the net, continuing the attacker’s impressive start to the season.
Max Little fired just beyond the far post as Southampton went close to a leveller, but a key moment arrived 18 minutes from time when Bangura – on at the break for his return to action after a short injury lay-off – seemingly struck out at an opponent and was promptly shown a straight red card.
With 10 men, we tried to defend in numbers, Ezra Agyekum making a fantastic goal-saving block from Korban McMullan, but you sensed the hosts were in with a chance and they duly equalised on 85 minutes when Fabio Sainsbury’s angled shot went in off the far post.
Just a minute later, the game was turned on its head as Harry Gathercole drilled low inside the near post and after we changed shape in an attempt to conjure up a late leveller, we were undone again on 89 minutes when Gathercole latched onto a cross-field ball and lashed high into the net, capping off a miserable ending to the game from our perspective.
‘Lessons to be learned’
Interim Under-18s Coach Joe Staunton underlined how the sending-off altered the outcome on the south coast, telling us: “We got ourselves into a favourable position where we were 2-1 up, finding a bit of rhythm and control and producing a couple of half-chances with good moments, but then an individual moment has ultimately cost us the result and made it difficult to find a way to hold onto the lead.
“It was a really slow start to the game – conceding a goal right in the early stages gives you an uphill battle but we found a way to get ourselves back into it and started to improve as the match went along, then obviously it was disappointing to go down to 10 men and we didn’t quite find a way to endure the suffering that was coming and conceded three goals towards the latter stages, so Southampton were deserving winners in the end.”
Asked what the players can learn from a tough outing like this, Joe added: “Every opportunity to play is an opportunity to learn whether you win, lose or draw, but quite often you can learn more from losing. We’re not hiding behind the fact that we’re disappointed because obviously we are, but with the sending-off there’s a lesson to be learned in terms of how you can react to the contact within the game and certainly a lesson to be learned on how to play when you’re underloaded and effectively try to run out the game with 10 men.”