Development Squad finish third in Ploufragan

Shilow Tracey’s goal just before half-time saw our Development Squad beat Stade Brestois 1-0 in the European Under-21 Tournament’s third place play-off in France on Sunday afternoon.

The attacker collected Paris Maghoma’s pass and slotted home in the 30 minutes each-way contest between the second-placed sides from the initial two groups, securing bronze for us and making it three wins out of four overall on our annual pre-season trip to Ploufragan.

Stade Rennais, who had inflicted our only defeat of the competition on Friday and stormed to first place in our group with three wins out of three, were beaten on penalties by Group A winners Standard Liege in the final.

Back-to-back victories over SM Caen and RC Strasbourg on Saturday saw us finish as runners-up in Group B, but the format of the competition – with no semi-finals – meant we went straight into the third place play-off.

We carried that winning momentum into the game against Brest and deservedly took a 28th-minute lead through Tracey, with Maghoma and Dilan Markanday involved in the build-up. Goalkeeper Josh Oluwayemi maintained his clean sheet with a couple of important saves, but we had to play out the closing stages with 10 men after defender Jubril Okedina was sent off two minutes before the end of normal time for an off-the-ball incident following a VAR review.

The result means we’ve gone one better than last year, where we finished fourth at the tournament. We lifted the trophy in 2017.

Spurs (v Stade Brestois): Oluwayemi, Statham (R Clarke 43), Hinds, Oakley-Boothe, Okedina, Binks, Tracey (Etete 54), A Shashoua (Thorpe 54), Sterling, Maghoma, Markanday.