Our men’s under-21s start their Premier League 2 campaign with a mouth-watering match against Crystal Palace on Monday, kick-off 7pm.
Andrew Crofts’ side travel to Selhurst Park having beaten Aston Villa and Littlehampton Town in their final two pre-season games, and the Albion head coach is feeling positive following a productive summer.
“Pre-season is always a nice time to build relationships and connections on and off the pitch, and this year was no different.” said Crofts.
“There has been a lot of hard work put in on the training pitch building up to this season and everyone can’t wait for it all to begin. The boys have gelled together nicely and we’ve given ourselves a great platform to build on.”
Victory over Littlehampton last Wednesday meant Albion ended their pre-season preparations with some silverware by lifting the Sussex Community Shield.
“It was a great test against a very good non-league side,” said the head coach. “It gave us a chance to work on some new ideas and build some winning momentum, which is always important at this time of year.
“With all the competitions we’re in this season, a match like that gave us a very different challenge and should hold us in good stead to improve on last season.”
Albion enjoyed a positive 2021/22 PL2 season and ended campaign with one of the best home records in the division, but Crofts is keen that they improve collectively and individually.
“Every player will have a different journey, but we want to enable them to have the best journey they can.” said Crofts.
“Ultimately, we are preparing them for first-team football, as last season showed with the debutants we had. We want to improve every individual as best we can and hopefully that improves us as group this season too. We’re ambitious and want to win every game we play.
“It's important to have that winning mentality, at whatever level you’re playing at, but the challenge for us is bigger than that in terms of marrying together the development of our squad and results on the pitch.”
The first win Crofts and his side will be aiming to claim is at Selhurst Park and the former Albion midfielder can’t wait to see his team in action.
He said, “Palace away is a great challenge to start. There’s extra emotion that comes with a derby game but being able to control that is important. We managed it last season across the derby games we played and we need to do that again.
“Palace are a good side but we’re ready for the challenge and excited by it. The boys have shown good signs throughout pre-season and now they have an opportunity to put their hard work into practice and start the season well.”