Gareth had two teams to face Macclesfield on Saturday afternoon. The first half team was a mix of experience and youth.
Robert Huth, Justin Hoyte, Didier Digard and Jeremie Aliadiere were joined by youngsters – Williams, Grounds, Walker, Cronesberry and Martin whilst new boys Mark Yeates and Danny Coyne were also given 45 first half minutes to gain some vital match fitness.
Yeates and Digard were very impressive in the first half. Mark was a real handful with his smart touches and great deliveries. The Frenchman was also showing his quality with his pin-point accurate passing – long and short.
The second half team was also a mix of older boys and stars of the future.
Gary O’Neil and Julio Arca were partnered in the middle of the park with Dutchman, Marvin Emnes up top with youngster – Jon Franks.
More of Boro’s young lads caught the eye in the second period. Franks rounded off a decent 45 minutes of play with a fine finish following a precision pass from Arca.
Porritt was very lively feeding Emnes on a couple of occasions with some great through balls. The flying Dutchman grabbed a goal as he turned neatly and powered a shot into the top corner.
Arca was also on the score sheet. The Argentine stepped up to slot home a harshly given penalty.
The winning start will give the players confidence going into their second friendly of pre-season. The squad travels to Scotland today for a game against Dumbarton on Wednesday evening.
Another test and another chance for Southgate to look at his squad.
UpTheBoro
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3.0 at Macclesfield , and so you should .
Another test, that was Macclesfield for ***** sake, nothing but a *****ing part time pub side.
KatieD – Look up test in the dictionary. You might be pleasantly surprised that you can have easy tests or hard tests. Although considering your recent comments you don’t know what an easy test is. Sorry we couldn’t play Barcelona or AC Milan. I will have a word with Southgate about that.
We beat another pub team last night KatieD, just wait till we play the Pig and Whistle at the weekend, i think we will give em a right porking don’t you ?.
A porking eh, love a good pork but never been to that pub, what’s it like?
Back to the football girls and boys. Darlo have cancelled the pre-season match against us next week. I wonder how quickly we can sort out a game against Real Madrid or Inter Milan?!
Or Oldham!!
ha ha slaven i like your style mate, are you implying that Oldham are not on parr with inter or real!!!!