Outstanding goals from Nathan Holland, Grady Diangana, Dan Kemp and a brilliant brace from Spanish forward Antonio Martinez was enough for Terry Westley’s youngsters to thrash Swansea City and continue a lengthy unbeaten run at The Chigwell Construction Stadium yesterday afternoon.
Our starlets have made a glorious start to life in The PL2 Division One, earning a fantastic point against the reigning Champions’ Everton and beating Tottenham Hotspur away from home with a stunning comeback.
As well as yesterday’s victory, the youngsters also shocked League Two Swindon Town 2-3 at The County Ground in The Checkatrade Trophy a fortnight ago. However, the margin of victory against Gary Richards’ men would be far greater.
Westley welcomed first-team right-back Sam Byram into his side for the seven-goal thriller, Domingos Quina also returned to the side after featuring for Slaven Bilic at Whaddon Road. Despite this, we were without the likes of new signing Sead Haksabanovic and Norway winger Martin Samuelsen, who have been linked with loan moves away.
Whereas, the visitors didn’t have the liberty of any first-teamers in their side, but did boast exciting prospects Kenji Gorre in attack, skipper Joe Rodon in midfield and the usually reliable Gregor Zabret in goal. However, he would succumb to the might of our attack as we blew the Welsh side away.
The Sunday lunchtime tie started in dream fashion at the home of Dagenham & Redbridge, as former Toffees midfielder Nathan Holland was slipped in by Moses Makasi to finish from a tight angle, just seconds after kick-off.
Despite our early lead, the visitors soon drew level against the run of play through George Byers. Our England U20 International keeper Nathan Trott was forced into a fine save but could only parry the ball to Byers, who tapped home from close range on 16 minutes.
The game was soon turning into an end to end thriller, with a pure moment of magic from Grady Diangana edging the balance of the tie back in our favor 10 minutes before the break.
The Englishman played an intricate one-two with Holland, before drilling the ball back across the face of goal and into the far top corner. But there would also be time for one more before half-time, as Martinez eventually scrambled the ball past Zabret to double the advantage.
Just when you thought that things couldn’t get any more spectacular for our bright starlets, Dan Kemp came up with a David Beckham-esque stunner to surely put the game out of Swansea’s reach.
The opposing keeper had run himself into all kinds of danger by charging off his line and clearing tamely, leaving Kemp the England Youth International, to blast home from 40 yards into the half empty net and make it 4-1.
After a period of comfortable dominance from our stellar starlets, the lead had finally been quadrupled by a contentious Martinez header. Another brilliant delivery from Holland found the former Valencia man, who glanced the ball into the net via a much heavier touch from Swans skipper Rodon.
The goal was originally thought to be an own-goal, but it was claimed by and eventually given to Martinez for his second goal of the campaign, after top scoring in last season’s Promotion from Division Two.
Just two minutes later, the Welsh side grabbed a constellation goal as No9 Courtney Baker-Richardson finished well past Trott in a one on one. But for the visitors, the notch came too late as they slumped a second defeat in the space of three games and remained rooted to the very bottom of the Division with just one point.
Whereas, the thrashing takes us up to second in The Premier League Two Division One with seven points from a possible nine and Liverpool the only team ahead of us.
Next up for Westley’s boys is a trip to face Spurs in The Premier League International Cup on Thursday afternoon at Stevenage’s Lamex Stadium, where we play an opponent that we have fond memories of playing against at all levels in recent times.