| Date: 22-07-22 Youthful Liverpool side punish Harriers |
Report by Dan Harper:
A fast tempo youthful Liverpool XI came away from Aggborough with a 3-1 victory following a promising, yet slightly wasteful, showing from the home side. It was a game that also saw Ethan Freemantle add to his ever-growing pre-season tally.
The Harriers saw the best of the early chances with the best of note being on the 17th minute where a cross-ball pass to Caleb Richards led to Trialist C being put through on goal only to have his finish expertly dealt with by the young Liverpool goalkeeper Luke Hewitson.
It would be a minute later that the theme of the night would start to become apparent when Jake Cain’s shot from the edge of the area landed in the back of Tom Palmer’s net following the inability to clear. Trialist C saw the best of the chances for the home side in the first half as four minutes later Tom Palmers cross pitch pass landed to his feet only for him to skew his chance wide and then soon after have an effort that would be parried away by the Liverpool shot-stopper.
The away side doubled their lead on the stroke of half time after the ball fell to the feet of Leighton Clarkson who thunderously hit the ball into the back of North Stand net.
HT: 0 – 2
The start of the second half saw a flock of changes introduced as Liverpool introduced four new faces – Dan Corness, Harvey Blair, Fidel O’Rourke and Oakley Cannonier as Jack Bearne, Layton Stewart, Mateusz Musialowski and Bobby Clark all made way. Harriers introduced a number of new faces with Joe Foulkes, Tom Leak and Yusifu Ceesay being three of note.
The second half began to show even more promise for the home supporters to look forward ahead of the season as, despite being two goals, down there was no shortage of fight from the fresh faced looking Harriers side. This would get its reward as only four minutes from the restart when a spilled Ceesay shot, as a result of an extremely rare error from Hewitson, left the goal at Ethan Freemantle’s mercy for him to apply the finishing touch.
The momentum would however be slightly interrupted as Harriers introduced even more to the field as the clock ticked over the hour mark as Zak Brown, Nathan Lowe, Jack Tolley and Keziah Martin were introduced. This once again gave the Harriers Online sponsored Jack Tolley the chance to impress, like he has done prior in these kinds of situations including last preseason, as he saw an effort deflect over the bar for a corner.
As the game edged into the three minutes of additional time Liverpool added their cherry on the top as Oakley Cannonier applied the finish touch from close range past substitute keeper Jamie Emery who earlier had been given a chance to shine replacing Tom Palmer.
Kidderminster Harriers’ next pre-season friendly will be when we welcome a Manchester United XI to Aggborough for the second year running which is on Tuesday 26th July and many Harriers fans will look forward to hopefully just as promising performance as today.
FT: 1 – 3
Harriers: Palmer, Lissimore, Richards, Knight-Percival, Pearce, Trialist A, Owen-Evans, Byrne, Trialist C, Hemmings, Trialist B.
Subs: Emery, Martin, Brown, Leak, Lowe, Foulkes, Ceesay, Freemantle, Tolley, Bastable, Trialist D, Harland, Hewett.
Liverpool XI: Hewitson, Stephenson, Norris, Jonas (Quansah 55), Chambers, Clarkson (Woltman 59), Bearne (Corness 46), Clark (Blair 46), Stewart (O’Rourke 46), Cain, Musialowski (Cannonier 46).
Subs: Corness, Morana, Blair, Woltman, Quansah, Cannonier, O’Rourke.
Referee: Neil Pratt. Cheltenham
Att: 2888 (462)