Archive
Beardsley: "A Win's A Win"
Written by Newcastle Utd
Peter Beardsley admitted that Newcastle's under-21s were made to work for victory over Crewe on Monday night, but was pleased with the result
By Dan King - Newcastle United Digital Editor
Newcastle needed extra time to see off Crewe Alexandra in the Under-21 Premier League Cup on Monday night, but Football Development Manager Peter Beardsley was pleased with the way his players dug deep to reach the last 16 thanks to Callum Roberts' brace.
United took a 39th-minute lead through 17-year-old Roberts but they failed to put the game to bed despite creating several good openings and the visitors forced extra time with George Cooper's 70th-minute strike. However, Roberts struck again in the 105th minute to prevent a penalty shoot-out.
Beardsley's boys sit top of the Barclays Under-21 Premier League second division and last week marched into the semi-finals of the Techflow Group Northumberland FA Senior Cup with a 7-0 win over Team Northumbria.
They were made to work a lot harder for their victory on Monday night but Beardsley told nufc.co.uk: "A win's a win and as I said to the kids, whatever cup competition you're in you want to try and do well.
"You look at what the first team have done this season and it'll be the same when the kids go and play at Millwall in the FA Youth Cup on 13th December. It's about winning.
"Crewe came here, played some good football and had a couple of decent opportunities but when you look at it overall, there's no doubt that we deserved to win - it just took us a bit longer than I would have liked.
"I know we lost at Middlesbrough in the last minute but it's probably the first time time we've really been in a game where it's been nip and tuck and could have gone either way.
"Once they equalised, they had a couple of good opportunities in extra time but if you look from start to finish, I think we deserved to win. But in the cup, you never know.
"At 1-0, when Bigi (Gael Bigirimana) hit the post, that was almost a turning point as it gave them a little bit of confidence that we weren't going to get a second goal and that they could start pushing further forward, which they did.
"They got the break and scored a decent goal for themselves and then it could have gone either way. We knew it would be tough but it was a good result."
For Roberts, his brace could barely have come at a better time. He was called into Alan Pardew's first-team squad for the weekend's win over Queens Park Rangers and, although he narrowly missed out on a place on the bench, the Magpies boss admitted that the teenager was "knocking on the door" of the senior set-up.
That knocking got a little louder on Monday night and Beardsley said: "He does score goals, there's no doubt about that.
"He creates chances, makes chances, takes chances. Alex Gilliead did fantastic for the first goal and Olivier (Kemen) put a great cross in the for the second goal.
"But Cal was very composed, nipped in front of the goalkeeper, controlled it and sidefooted it in which good players do.
"Ben (Dawson, Professional Development Phase Coach) has been talking to him about (Lionel) Messi, about how he doesn't blast everything but sidefoots goals in. Cal sidefooted the first goal in and then the second one was easy.
"He's got a lot of ability. The manager obviously likes him with him getting promoted to the first-team squad, and that's what this job's about - trying to get kids to the next level."