Town youngsters faced tough test against Garuda Select on Tuesday afternoon
- Under-17s faced off against Garuda Select at Loughborough
- Goals from Cian Philpott and Tyree Sanusi
- Midfielder Cian gives his thoughts
Huddersfield Town’s Young Terriers had a different kind of test in Loughborough on Tuesday afternoon as they took on Indonesian side Garuda Select.
The game got off to a very fast paced start, with both sides pressing forward at every opportunity.
As the game settled, Town dominated possession, but Garuda threatened the goal more often with their aggressive press and quick counter attacks.
Chances fell Garuda’s way throughout the first half, but their inability to finish them, plus some big saves from Michael Acquah, saw both teams head into the break with the scoreline deadlocked.
The second half saw the hosts continue to enjoy the majority of possession, taking the lead in the 54th minute thanks to Hokky Caraka.
Cakara went on to score his second four minutes later, before sealing his hat-trick in the 72nd minute.
Town pulled one back in five minutes later, as they were handed a penalty for a foul on Hazeem Bakare. Cian Philpott stepped up and made no mistake from the spot!
As the game headed into the final 10 minutes of normal time, Mufli Hidayat scored two in as many minutes to put the game to bed.
The final goal of the game came from Tyree Sanusi, who pulled another back for Town with a lovely finish across the hosts’ ‘keeper.
Speaking after the game, Under-17 midfielder Cian Philpott gave his thoughts on the game.
“It was a difficult game. We could never really get going, they were aggressive and pressed quite high.
“They stopped us from playing our way, we had our spells, but it wasn’t enough.
“I tried to go forward as much as possible to get the team back into the game.
“I think we could have defended better – me and team – we let in easy goals that we could have stopped.”
The 17-year-old went on to explain what him and his teammates can learn from Tuesday’s game.
“We learnt a lot about different styles of play.
“We’re not always going to play teams that sit behind the ball, there are teams that will really come after us and work us hard.
“If we play another team like Garuda, it won’t be a shock to us because we’ll know how to play against it now.
“We’ll take that more aggressive style of play and play a lot quicker in our usual games.
“We can take a lot of what we’ve seen and learnt from this game into the games we play in the league.”
