Villa Youngsters Go Marching On

Villa's Youth team thumped Millwall 4-1 in last night's fifth round tie, with Arsenio Halfhuid bagging himself a hattrick.

Tony McAndrew was 'over the moon' as you'd imagine in his after match comments on the Official Site as it seems it'll be yet another year where our Youth team shine.

The story is stranger than that though, some of you may remember the signing of Halfhuid, a highly rated centre half back in January, but it seems McAndrew has noticed something in him that others had missed.

Well centre half, playing upfront, bagging a hattrick - you would say McAndrew has got it spot on.

'Arsenio came here as a centre back but little bits in training showed he looks ok in front of goal. I just had a gut feeling about it.'

Some gut feeling, and I'd say with a hattrick maybe he's a bit better than 'ok' in front of goal.

It's come at a good time for the Youth squad though, with various injuries leaving us a bit threadbare upfront, along with missing the very influential Gary Gardner it's good to see other lads taking the lead and staking their claim.

Our opener was scored by Ryan Simmonds who captained the squad, and he also set up each of Halfhuid's goals - so I think he's added his name to the lists of 'ones to watch'.

'I wanted to give Simmo some responsibility and see how well he coped with it. He led by example and some of his positional play to receive the ball was superb.'

Onwards and upwards for the Youth again this year, that said do we expect anything differently now?

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