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Academy Notes: Jeremy Santos

Charlton Athletic U23s midfielder Jeremy Santos spoke to Valley Gold for Academy Notes after the recent 3-1 defeat at Colchester United.

The attacking midfielder has been at Charlton’s academy since he was eight years old and believes his strengths as his 1-versus-1 play and his ability to manage the ball under pressure. Talking about the disappointing defeat in Essex, he told Valley Gold:

“It was an unpleasant game of football to watch as we did not manage to retain possession of the ball well enough to build, create or convert chances.

“In the first half, we struggled to progress the ball with any quality and therefore invited a very good high press from Colchester. They managed several turnovers and created lots of chances as a result. Colchester had the beating of us in competing for first contacts and were very effective in turning the ball in behind our defensive line and applying pressure.

“Against the run of play, our goal came from a lucky mistake when the Colchester United goalkeeper spilled a routine pickup allowing Daniel Kanu who was quickest to react to unselfishly set up Wassim Aouachria to score into an open goal.

“However, this lead was short-lived as the home side broke through our defence with a clever piece of combination play to level the scores. They went on to take the lead shortly after, following a mistake from our goalkeeper Nathan Harvey. Nathan got caught receiving a back pass and conceded a penalty, which they duly converted. In the latter stages of the first half, they once again pounced on our sloppy build-up play to slice through our defence to make the scoreline 3-1 at the interval.

“We came out for the second half with the intention to apply more pressure and start to attack key areas more directly, and by doing so we managed to create more chances and limited Colchester’s opportunities. Despite our efforts and good chances, the scoreline remained 3-1 – a bad defeat for us.”

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