Our post 16 academy squad 1, came up short in their recent fixture against Dartford FC in the SCL League.

Having comprehensively beaten Dartford at home, the lads were confident they had enough to take all 3 points in this fixture to help with our quest for runners up in the South East division.

Our depleted squad struggled, with abscences due to covid and injuries for key defenders Charlie Mayo and Kian Simmons along with midfielders Alex Joy and Mo Hassan. A thrilling first half saw us trailing 3-2 at the break, with goals from the impressive Charlie Larter and Omar Abbas, who are forming quite the partnership. In the second half we were unable to unlock Dartford's defence another time, before giving away a goal in the last minute on the break.

Academy manager Henry Muggeridge had this to say on our latest performance:

'Take nothing away from these lads they have given me absoloutely everything today, and I am so very proud of each and every one of them. When we played Dartford earlier in the season we kept a clean sheet. Today we gave away 4 goals, that shows how important the lads are who we were missing, and is a big compliment to them. Without the forward options Alex and Mo give us we were limited with choices of how we could get back into the game, and unfortunately as explosive as Charlie and Omar were in the first half, they tired in the second half and that's something they both need to work towards. Having played the professional gam as a full back myself I was extremely impressed by both our full backs today, Nathan Kirkby and Alfie Dennis, both of whom were playing out of position, hopefully both can kick on now and earn themselves some appearances in senior football before the end of the season, as that was the level they showed today.'

The Scholars will now have a week break for the February half term.