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Academy

ACADEMY: Under-18s beat Birmingham City in dominant display

Gary Mills and his players are in fine form in the Under-18s Professional Development League...

20 February 2023

Sky Blues Under-18s stormed to a 2-1 win over Birmingham City on Saturday afternoon as they returned to winning ways in the U18s Professional Development League.

City coach Gary Mills was delighted with the way his young group took "total control" of the fixture, despite the game's narrow scoreline.

After a bright start from the young Sky Blues, it was Birmingham who took the lead early on. However, a double from Charlie Manners (assisted by Isaac Moore and Bradley Stretton) soon turned the game around to ensure that Coventry's impressive run of form continued.

Speaking following the win, Mills said: "It was a great performance. We dominated the possession and our wide players were a threat all game.

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"We fell behind to a sloppy goal and we should have done better but there was no panic from the lads, they were performing really well.

"We then scored a really good goal through Charlie Manners, after some good work from Isaac to cross inside to him.

"From there, we were in total control and Bradley Stretton cut inside to shoot from range and that was then turned in by Manners, who was brilliant all afternoon.

"The lads were back to the standard that they had set previously, after some difficult results against Crewe (draw) and Bristol City (defeat)."

Mills continued: "We got back to working hard, which is key to our game in how we win the ball back.

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"We displayed some really good patterns that we had worked on and we had full control."

Manners, a young striker amongst City's ranks, has been among the goals throughout the campaign in Sky Blue - and his manager was delighted to see him add two more to his tally over the weekend.

Mills said: "He's a good goalscorer but he's an even better lad. He's had to be patient recently, as he has not had as many minutes as he would like.

"He shows some really good behaviors on and off the pitch and he gets into the areas that you would want a number nine to, and he showed two brilliant finishes against Birmingham."


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