Eric Kinder on the Tranmere away game
Youth boss Eric Kinder spoke to us about the away draw at Tranmere on Saturday morning.
"We were without Pat Brough, Tom Berwick and Brad Staunch so that weakened us a bit. Patrick gives us a bit of balance and Tom is the captain, so he stands out when he isn't there. That gave us the opportunity to blood three of next year's side though and all three of them played well," he said.
"I think the result was the right one. We didn't deserve to lose but we probably didn't deserve to win either," he added. "It was another early start for us, which the lads struggle with, and before we knew what was happening we'd conceded a goal. It was disappointing because it was from a set-piece and we'd talked about that on Friday, as we knew what they were going to do. That's a learning process for them and they probably need to take more notice of what we tell them in future.
"Jack Lynch took a great free kick from the right hand side and Alex [Salmon] lost his marker on the back post to put us level. That was with half an hour on the clock. Jack bent the ball in brilliantly but it was Alex's movement that got us the goal. We dominated the rest of the first half and we didn't want half time to come because we thought it would upset our rhythm. They got a roasting from their coach, which you could have heard for miles, so they were either going to react to that or go under.
"We didn't start the second half particularly well but it was quite even and neither team really looked like they were going to score. We conceded from another free kick, which is very frustrating. Nobody attacked the ball and their lad had a free header which put us 2-1 down with only ten minutes left to go. It looked like that would be it, but Danny Hodgson showed quick feet in the six-yard box and he took his goal very well. Obviously that earned us the draw.
"They'll probably feel a bit aggrieved that they couldn't hold on for the last ten minutes but, like I said, I don't think we deserved to lose. The main positive has to be the three lads for next year playing well, but hopefully we'll get the three second years back for the next game because that's an important one for us."
"I try to get the new lads involved as much as I can in the last month of the season to give them some experience," he added. "Our first years this year had five games at the end of last season and I think that helped them.
"We played away at TyneMet College last week during half term and we used next year's side. It was very encouraging, they came together really quickly and I was impressed with them as a group. We won 3-2 and we've got some decent players who should bed into the side quickly. I'll carry on giving them as much game time as I can between now and the end of the season.
"We haven't done ourselves justice in the league this season. We've got into the Alliance cup final, which is brilliant, but we could have done so much better. Out of the games we've lost I think we've only deserved to lose the one at Blackpool. The rest of them have been really tight and we've let ourselves down with our defending and our finishing."
United: Parker, Gwinnutt, Chisholm (McEvoy), Morse, Minor, Hammell, Lynch, Wallace, Thompson (Hodgson), Dempsey, Salmon. Subs: Brass, Clarey.
On the ongoing work for next season, Kinder added: "We've signed Danny Eccles, who is a goalkeeper. He was released from Burnley and he signed his pre-contract terms last week, so that gives us two goalkeepers for next season now.
"Lewis Brass is going on work experience to Penrith for a week, which will stand him in good stead for next season. Their keeper got sent off so they need some cover for a couple of games. He'll miss our Walsall and Rochdale home games so we'll bring in Danny as cover for Jordan Parker for those."