Fleetwood Town

Youth team boss said players will learn from defeat

Fleetwood Town youth team manager Nathan Rooney admitted Burnley were the better team as they lost 3-0 at home to the Clarets on Tuesday.

The Cod Army were 1-0 down at half time, but conceded two more in the second half as Town lost at home for the first time in 2016.

Rooney gave credit to the opposition’s performance, but believed the goals could have been avoided.

“It’s the harsh reality of the game,” he said. “I think after the mistakes which allowed Burnley to go on and win the game, we struggled to lift ourselves back up again.

“Burnley were very good, their system worked well. Big credit to them because I thought they put the ball in the net at the correct times.

“There was a lack of quality [from us] in the second half. The positive about this group at the moment though is we’ve got Nathan Sheron who’s now training up [with the development squad]. There’s a lot of boys who have been
training up with the [under] 21’s.”

Despite the loss, Rooney believes the experience will help the players develop in the long run.

“These are the games you want to learn from. The positive from this is that it’s something new that we haven’t experienced this year.

“The lads can take things from it. We’ll freshen it up this week in training, and make it fun as well.”

He also remained upbeat about the future of the squad adding: “We will look to freshen the under 18 set-up with youngsters and give the next batch of players a good chance now, heading into the new season.

“This has been a bit of an up and down season. It was obviously great at the start. Behind the scenes, the lads do continue to put a big shift in every single week.

“I would like to draw a line through this and polish up on the team going into the Walsall game.”