Josh Onomah experienced a range of emotions during Thursday night’s defeat in Anderlecht.
The 18-year-old midfielder made only his second senior appearance for us – and his first of the current season – when he replaced Andros Townsend for the last 10 minutes of our Europa League Group J clash in Brussels.
With the team trailing 2-1, the youngster was determined to help turn the game back in our favour but, ultimately, we couldn’t find a way back into it and suffered our first defeat of this European campaign.
While understandably pleased to get a first team opportunity, Josh said the final score left him as disappointed as everybody else.
“It’s definitely mixed emotions,” he said. “I’m obviously disappointed with the loss but I was happy to come on and try to make an impact.
“It was a mix of buzz and nerves when I came on but I was ready. I’d been waiting to come on and I’m happy that it’s come today.
“It was quite hard with the home fans roaring but at the same time I was excited. It’s just unfortunate that we couldn’t score in the last few minutes.
“Hopefully next time I’ll be able to influence the game either with a goal or an assist, but for now we’ve got training again so we’ll start from there again and hopefully I’ll get my chance again.”