Charlton Athletic U18s striker Chibi Okechukwu spoke to Valley Gold for Academy Notes after the recent 6-3 win at Millwall in the Professional Development League Cup.
The young forward signed for the Charlton Athletic Academy at 16 and describes his strengths as his speed, strength and finishing. He told Valley Gold:
“Within 10 minutes we were 2-0 up and we were quite comfortable, however, Millwall still had pretty good possession and their No 9 was causing our backline problems. But with our team’s extreme pace on counter-attacks and decisiveness, we were at a point in the first half where we were 4-0 up but we still could not get solid possession, we tried to push forward at every turn but on the regain we should have just kept it and got into shape.
“This lack of composure on the ball nearly cost us as they had a free kick on the edge of our box which was excellently saved by Ahmed Kone but they scored on the rebound. Luckily it was ruled offside but it was a warning sign for things to come in the second half.
“After the break, we had good possession and were shifting the ball quickly in their half. They did not have much breathing space but after the good spell of possession we started to concede sloppy goals and one went in from their No 9 and after that, they just began to fly in.
“Before we knew it it was 4-3 and we were on the backfoot and nothing was going well. We could barely get the ball out of our half and were giving away a lot of corners which just mounted the pressure even more.
“From a corner, which we had worked on in training and a quick counter we were 6-3 up; both goals from Daniel Kanu to complete his first hat-trick of the season.
“Overall it was a good win and we had many great things to take away from how we moved forward and attacked but we need to be more compact and willing to defend, especially as the game gets on because scoring 6 is great but conceding 3 means there is obvious room for improvement!”
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