Fleetwood Town's Under-18s finished out an impressive showing as they managed to beat Port Vale 2-1 at Poolfoot Farm on Saturday morning.
The young Cods showed grit and determination in their recent Youth Alliance clash as they came back from behind to take all three points from the Valiants as Sam Barratt and Akiel Raffie both got on the score sheet.
The game started slowly, as we had to wait until the 40th minute for the first real chance of the game. It started with Cian Hayes switching the play from left to right, Finding Joe Collins. He fed the ball to the overlapping Sam Bird, who crossed it to Covy Smith, whose shot went just wide of the near post.
Vale broke the deadlock just after the hour mark as they produced some nice passing play on the left-wing, before playing the ball to the edge of the box, where their deep midfielder struck the ball with venom towards the Town goal. Connor Eastham parried the ball into the six-yard box, but the opposition were able to tap home the rebound.
With 20 minutes to go, Bird stormed down the right-wing and crossed the ball into a packed box, where substitute Enoch Takpe rose highest and headed just wide of the far post.
Town drew level in the 75th minute as Raffie lined up a free-kick from 25-yards and seemed to catch the 'keeper off guard as he struck the ball into the near-post, bouncing off the number one's back on the way in.
As the game started to draw to a close, Town managed to complete the comeback from a corner. Harry Wilson got on the end of the set-piece, but it was a Barratt thunderbolt at the back post that flew into the top right corner of the goal, which secured the points.
The young Cods are sat at the top of the Youth Alliance league table after that result, five points ahead of second-place, Carlisle United. The Under-18s are back at Poolfoot on Saturday 10 April for their next fixture, which is against Rochdale at 10:30am.
Town XI: Eastham (GK), Bird, Batch, Wilson, Patterson, Barratt, Collins, Raffie, Smith, Thompson, Hayes.
Bench: Borwick (GK), Sithole, Wallace, Takpe, Hoyle.