Following our U21s’ 4-0 loss to Millwall, Tom Harban made sure to highlight how important it is for the young Reds to learn the basics and learn from their own mistakes.
A difficult 90 minutes for the young Reds ultimately resulted in them being dismantled by their hosts. Quality all over the pitch from the home team was the deciding factor of the game, as the Barnsley struggled to get into gear at the Den.
“It’s disappointing,” began Harban, frustrated with his team’s performance. “We’ve caused our own problems in the game. All four goals were avoidable and without those chances I don’t think there was really much in it.
“I think if you look at the game and the balance of it in the first 15 minutes there was nothing really in it. It’s a sucker punch, but we’ve given them too much time around and at the edge of our box to get a turn and a free shot off. We have to learn, that can’t happen.
“I thought we did better in terms of playing forward and making forward runs in the opening stages compared to last week, but when we’re in the game and we give away sloppy goals we’re going to find it tough.”
Although the score line suggests otherwise, the game was fairly even, just decided by individual moments. Quality defending from Jasper Moon caught the eye of Harban who was quick to praise his performance.
“I think Jasper played quite well,” he continued. “He’s come here to get some minutes under his belt, and I think he only made one error with a pass into midfield which was cut out, but they defended the counter-attack in the end.
“The rest of it was bitty. The lads did okay in spells and then they did some things that I’m not so sure about. But they did work hard and they ran about. Can they be a little more aggressive? Yeah. Back each other up a little bit more? Yeah. Overall, we’ve lost a game 4-0 so how many positives can I really pick out?”
Our U21s’ next game is against Ipswich Town, who’s victory over Wigan today suggests the Reds will be in for another tough match.
“We’ve just got to learn,” Harban asserted when asked how the team would prepare for the next fixture. “We’re a very young team and we’ve got to learn now, because we’re playing against teams that are a little bit older, a little bit more physical and play football like it should be in the Championship and League One.
“We’ve just got to understand the basics really. We have to get a lot better at them. The players know there’s loads of bits we can pick out from the game that we want to be better at with the ball and we will get there as long as the players are willing to buy into it.”
