Swindon Town Under-18s manager Sean Wood admitted his side faces a tough challenge against Luton Town in the Youth Alliance Cup round of 16.
Swindon face the Hatters on Tuesday afternoon in search of a victory to advance to the quarterfinals.
Town had major success in the group stages, remaining unbeaten whilst scoring 15 goals and conceding just two. They were the only side to win all their fixtures, and their +13-goal difference ranked the highest.
Despite their strong form in the competition, Swindon will be looking to bounce back after their recent exit from the Professional Development League Cup, where they suffered a 4-2 extra-time defeat away to Peterborough United in the quarterfinals.
“It will be a difficult game for the boys to look forward to,” said Wood.
“The boys have to just get together now and make sure that there’s no sulking around the building, be smiling, be learning from the experience, and we’ll go again.
“We’ll try to get another positive performance, like many of this year so far, and try and progress into the next stage of the Youth Alliance League Cup.”
Last time out, Swindon showed resilience against Peterborough, coming from two goals down, thanks to a Kian Larkins strike and an own goal sending the game to extra time. However, they ultimately fell short.
“It was a really slow start for the lads, not typical of what we’re about, not quite sure what it was,” said Wood.
“We got to half-time, still in the game, but it could have been out of sight against a really good possession-based team, so full credit to them.
“In the second half we gave it a go, competed a lot more, and managed to get ourselves back in the game with a fortunate own goal.
“I thought the momentum swung a little bit in our favour, and we could have maybe nicked it within the 90 minutes.”
Wood added: “We didn’t give up; we stuck to it, but if we’re being fair to them, they were probably the better side.”
It was the first time Swindon’s academy had ever appeared in the PDL Cup, and the U18s topped their group, which saw them qualify for the knockout stages. Despite the recent loss, Wood was pleased with their overall display in an unfamiliar competition.
He said: “We’ve been on a fantastic run to win the group with Category 2 teams like Cardiff, Bournemouth and Portsmouth within that group.
“To qualify was a fantastic achievement. I know they wanted to go on and try to get to the final, and that won’t happen now, but they have to learn from these experiences of playing against Category 2 teams, who have more about them with and without the ball, and tactically a little bit better.
“It has been a brilliant experience. Hopefully, we get that opportunity for under-18s going forward, because sometimes a Category 3 games program can be the same teams that you play so many times in the year, so it gives us different variables, but we’ll learn from it and move forward.”
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