Fulham U18s 4-3 Leicester U18s

Fulham Under-18s secured all three points in a dramatic game at Motspur Park which finished 4-3 on Saturday afternoon.

It was a quick start from the visiting team, who opened the scoring in just the second minute through Kirsten Otchere, who got on the end of a parried save from Dino Kaiser and smashed the ball past him on the rebound.

It didn’t take long for the young Whites to get themselves back into the game however, when a diagonal ball from Damon Park was eventually played into Bradley De Jesus, who combined nicely with Tom Olyott, before he played it back to Ma’Kel Bogle-Campbell to score with his first touch.

On the stroke of half-time, Olyott would score his first of the game, when he skipped past his man, opening up the goal for himself to smash the ball home nicely.

Into the second-half and Leicester’s substitute Jake Evans scored with what must have been his first touch of the game. A corner swung in was dealt with well by Ali Melloul’s side, but the ball was sent back into the danger zone and finished by Evans.

In the 64^th minute, Leicester’s first goalscorer, Otchere, received a second yellow card for delaying play, bringing the away side down to ten men.

Fulham took advantage of the extra man just six minutes later, having pinned back the visitors in their own half. It was an excellently taken shot by Tom, who touched the ball perfectly with his right foot, and finished it with his left through bodies and past the ‘keeper.

The action was far from over though, with Leicester equalling the game once more through a counter-attack. Dino made the first save onto the crossbar, which ricocheted back into play, to be headed into the ground by Will Lawrence, bouncing frustratingly over our ‘keeper.

With 88 minutes on the clock, Olyott stepped up with not just a late winner but his hat-trick too. It was a great interchange of positions between Tom and Josh King, the latter finding Tom with a nice pass, before rolling inside and beating Steve Bausor for pace from 18 yards with a low, driven shot.

The win pushed Fulham Under-18s up to fourth in the league table with three games having been played so far.