Swansea City Under-18s Leicester City
11th March
Goals from Sean Hanbury, Liam Cullen and Causso Darame ensured Swansea City Under-18s began their merit division campaign with a win.
The home side could have taken the lead inside ten minutes as Causso Darame's ball allowed Keiran Evans to break on the right wing and beat the keeper into the box, only to see his shot blocked on the line by Foxes defender Calvin Ughelumba.
Swansea did take the lead midway through the first half as Sean Hanbury shook off the defence on the left wing to round the Leicester's keeper into the box before slotting into the empty net.
Full-back Mael Davies almost doubled the lead minutes before half time with a powerful 30 yard strike that was saved by Foxes keeper Adam Harrison.
The Swans could have scored from the resulting corner, but Marco Dulca's header was unfortunate to be deflected over the bar before Alex Lang kept the Swans lead in tact on the stroke of half time as he saved Harrison Myring's shot from inside the area.
Swansea continued to create chances in the second half as substitute Liam Cullen made a welcome return from injury and almost doubled the lead on the hour mark only for Harrison to deny the striker.
Soon after Oliver Cooper's cross from the left wing found Cullen in the area but the striker could not keep his shot down from six yards.
The misses didn't matter as the Swans did extend their lead in the 70th minute as Darame's pass allowed Cullen to beat the oncoming keeper to clamly slot into the net.
A minute later at the Swnas made it 3-0 as Cullen turned provider with a cross from the right for Darame to flick into the goal.
Leicester tried to get something from the game as Lang saved efforts from Tom Fielding and Harrison Myring.
A consolation in the 90th minute from Foxes defender Cal Templeton didn't take the shine of a fine performance from the Swans to take their first three points on group 3.
SWANS U18s: Alex Lang, Bailey Owen, Mael Davies, Marco Dulca, Joe Lewis, Brandon Cooper (Capt), Causso Darame (Matthew Roberts, 85), Tom Price (Finley Hazell, 81), Sean Hanbury (Liam Cullen, 57), Keiran Evans, Oliver Cooper.
UNUSED SUBS: Ben Cabango, Nathan Shepperd.
LEICESTER CITY U18s: Adam Harrison, Simran Thandi, Calvin Ughelumba, Conor Tee, George Heaven, Cal Templeton, Tom Fielding, Kanya Leshabela, Harrison Myring, Dylan Bollard (Leon Lewis, 78), Luke Thomas (Kian Williams, 67).
UNUSED SUBS: Kaird Edwards-John.
