A good crowd of around 500 (mainly kids on their school holidays) turned up to see a more experienced reserve side than normal take on the might of Dorset, Bournemouth stiffs and hammer them 4-0. Town lined up as follows (5-3-2 formation):
Salmon, Kennedy, Keeble, Tanner, Mowbray, Brown (captain), Logan, Niven, Axeldal, Midgely, Magilton. No subs were used.
The opening 20 minutes was mainly one way traffic with Town opening up Bournemouth's offside trap on several occasions. Magilton's radar appeared to be working from the off and some good passes were made by all. Keeble, who had a good game on the left side, opened the scoring and Midgley made it two after about 35 mins.
On the rare occasions Bournemouth attacked the back three of Tanner, Mogga and Brown ensured Salmon had little to do.
The 2nd half continued in much the same vein and a screamer from Niven (my MOM) and a 2nd for Midgley, who reminds me of a young Dozzell, put a true reflection on Town's dominance.
All the pre-season casualties appeared to come through the 90 minutes unscathed and I would reckon that Magilton and Tanner will probably both be on the bench on Saturday. I don't think that either of them or Mogga is fully match fit yet. Axeldal showed a lot of purpose and running, although he needs to show a bit more sharpness in the penalty box. The next youngster to break through could be any one of five (Keeble, Brown, Niven, Logan and Midgley) and shows that George Burley's youth policy shows little sign of drying up just yet.
Gary Marks