American visitors made to work for narrow win; Teesside Athletic Under-14 Friendly Cape Cod Crusaders 2-1 Teesside Athletic.

MIDDLESBROUGH'S Hurworth Training Complex was the venue for an international friendly football match as Teesside played host to an American team on Monday, August 18.

The youngsters of Cape Cod Crusaders maintained their 100% record but were made to fight all the way in an entertaining match.

Cape Cod made an impressive opening and Spencer was called on to make some early saves.

But Teesside's pace gave Cape Cod problems and Kelly came close to opening the scoring, breaking down the right but saw his shot beat the keeper to go just past the post.

Cape Cod took the lead in the 32nd minute when Sarkhis hit a tremendous long range shot perfectly into the top corner.

Teesside hit back straight away and Mentz saw his shot cleared off the line.

The equaliser came on 56 minutes from the penalty spot after Wright had been brought down. Sandie struck his shot hard and low to the keeper's left.

The American age groups are different to the English which resulted in an age difference of 18 months between some players in the American team's favour.

This advantage certainly showed in the last quarter, which the Americans dominated, and it took some excellent defending by Wright and Lillystone to hold them at bay whilst Spencer made one outstanding reaction save to push a powerful header over.

The winner finally came with 11 minutes remaining when a Teesside defender made a last ditch attempt to prevent a Cape Cod striker from scoring but only succeeded in putting the ball past his keeper for an unfortunate own goal.

Team: Spencer, Enderwick, Winspear, Lillystone, Hitchen, Mentz, Hill, Wright, Gray, Sandie, Kelly, McGowan

CAPTION(S):

CLOSE BATTLE: Teesside Athletic and opponents, the Cape Cod Crusaders, above