U18 Match Preview | Cardiff City vs. Fleetwood Town

Joseff Edwards in training for Cardiff City U18
Cardiff City’s U18 side continue their PDL campaign on Saturday, as they welcome Fleetwood Town to Cardiff International Sports Campus – KO at 11am.

After a run of three straight wins, the Bluebirds suffered a defeat last weekend at the hands of Burnley, with Ronan Kpakio getting himself on the scoresheet for City. That loss was the side’s first since the start of March.

Tom Hutton’s side stay fourth in the PDL South. They are eight points behind Charlton Athletic, who occupy the final Play-Off place with five games remaining.

The first of those five games takes place on Saturday morning, as City welcome Fleetwood Town to Leckwith. The Cod Army come into this contest in seventh place in the PDL North, having won eleven of their 27 games so far this season. The Fishermen have been struggling for form as they head down to the capital, having not won in their last six, and were defeated 6-1 at home to Ipswich Town in their last game. 

Tom Hutton in training for Cardiff City U18

We spoke to head coach Hutton ahead of Saturday's fixture. 

"Preparation has been really positive this week," Tom began. "We've had the U21s training with us, which has helped us improve our preparation. There are still challenges around how we prepare the boys at this stage of the season. We have quite a few U16s involved, who are in school, so it's just about being creative and proactive in the way that we prepare the boys for matches. 

"The last few weeks have been largely positive. Going into the Burnley game, we were quite critical of the performances of the boys and although they picked up positive results, we felt that we hadn't been playing as well as we should have been. On Saturday against Burnley, we knew it was going to be a challenging fixture, but it was one of the best performances of the season and we've come away with no points. We took the positives out of it, the performance was excellent, but when you're working with young players, you can't discard the result. It's vitally important that the boys have a will to win and that was there on Saturday.

"As an Academy, we're really proud of the progress that has been made over the last few weeks. Not just coaching staff, but everyone deserves a pat on the back for the performances of the boys for the First Team against Southampton. That's what we're all striving for. But also, our younger players have stepped up into older age groups all season and that bodes really well for the future."

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