Blues forward Nico Valentine says he and his U18s teammates will be able to look back on great memories of their hugely impressive FA Youth Cup run but now it’s important for them to take that form into their league games.
Second-year scholar Valentine scored Town’s second goal in last night’s 4-2 after-extra-time defeat to West Ham at Portman Road as the Blues took the U18 Premier League South leaders right to the end of the 120 minutes despite having been reduced to 10 men.
Valentine, who was called up to an England U17s camp at the start of last season, moved the ball out of a tight area on the left before cutting in and smashing a low shot past the Hammers keeper to, briefly as it turned out, restore Town's lead.
"It was difficult playing 10-v-11, sitting behind the ball for that period of time and I think it’s mentally draining,” Valentine said.
"But I think when you do get the opportunity to go forward and start an attack, it’s very rare that you can get shots off in that situation, so I think I’ve just seen the chance to shoot and let it go and it’s hit the back of the net.
"I like to receive the ball in tight areas. I’ve got the ability to beat two or three with two or three touches and then create space for either me or someone else.
"On that occasion it fell for me to have the shot, but I think there were a few occasions where I’ve looked for the pass as well.”
Valentine enjoyed his second experience of an FA Youth Cup run having been in the team which reached the semi-finals before losing 2-1 at home to Liverpool - who the Blues beat 2-0 in the last round this year - in the summer of 2021 when still a Debenham High School pupil.
"I was lucky enough to experience it two years ago when we got to the semi-final and they were very similar journeys,” he said.
"I think that gave me good experience to know what to do in these situations. I think you can help the ones that haven’t necessarily played too much FA Youth Cup across the game as well.
"This year is my age group, so there’s been boys that I’ve played with since we were six years old and I think we’ve built a connection. We know the way in which everyone wants to play now and I think we’ve showed that out there and showed the grit and determination we’ve got as well.
"I think the Youth Cup is a way of creating memories for ever and that’s a big part of the scholarship as well.
"When you come into the building full-time, everyone’s looking forward to the Youth Cup. You should treat every game the same but I think there is a different buzz around the Youth Cup with fans coming in, playing at the stadium.
"I think the more we’ve played at the stadium, the more it’s become normal. It doesn’t faze us any more, we just like to play in front of fans.”
The run saw the Blues beat two category one academies, Nottingham Forest on penalties prior to the victory over Liverpool, and take a third to extra-time with 10 men.
But Valentine says he and his teammates were never overawed when taking on teams from bigger name clubs.
"I think throughout the time we’ve all been in the academy, we’ve all had the chance to play against category one sides,” he reflected.
"And when you’re a bit younger you see the Tottenhams, the Chelseas, the West Hams and clubs like that and you think they’ll be streets ahead, but I think the more you play against them and the more we train together, we create principles and a way of playing.
"And once we start playing with the principles, our way of playing, I think we can go anywhere in the country and compete, and I think that’s what we’ve created, and the environment we’ve created as well.”
Prior to Callum Logan’s red card in the 33rd minute the Blues were 1-0 in front and deservedly so.
"I think all the boys out there felt that we were on top and we were on the front foot,” Valentine recalled.
"And even when we went down to 10 men, we were still creating chances. I think towards the end of the first half, we had two or three opportunities to score, so I don’t think it was necessarily down to losing a man.
"I think we adapted well and a lot of us hadn’t experienced that before, so I think that’s an experience we can take into the future as well.”
While he says the run is something they can all look back on, Valentine feels they now need to their Youth Cup performances into their Professional Development League Two South games.
"We’ve spoken down there, obviously you create the memories,” he said. "But football at this age isn’t going to necessarily dictate your career, so we’ve got to go and do the same things every single day consistently, regularly. Go back into the league programme and make sure we keep it the same.
"I think it would be criminal to come into games like this and change everything we do, big it up and make it a different game because it’s not, it’s just another game and now we’re ready to go back to the league programme.”