Goals from Antonio Martinez and Martin Samuelsen ensured a win of huge importance over The Black Cats at The Eppleton Colliery Welfare Ground yesterday lunchtime, as we ended a run of three consecutive defeats with a huge win.
On a weekend where the First-Team were so narrowly edged out by Tottenham Hotspur at The London Stadium, our Hammer starlets held out for their own narrow victory.
The youngsters had raced into a two-goal lead before the half-hour mark in Hetton-Le-Hole, but a Luke Molyneux strike made sure of making things interesting and the score-line closer than the clash actually was.
In terms of the two Teams, Terry Westley had made three changes with Nathan Holland, Joe Powell and Grady Diangana replacing Marcus Browne, Jahmal Hector-Ingram and Tunji Akinola from Monday’s home defeat at the hands of League Leaders Liverpool.
Whereas, Elliot Dickman had young prodigy Duncan Watmore at his disposal again with plenty of young talent on show from the home Side, not least the likes of Rees Greenwood and Brendan Taylor.
The affair started the most brightly for the hosts, as Alex Pike’s mistake almost led to Watmore giving his Side the lead but Nathan Trott saved well to deny him.
However, we soon hit back and promptly led through prolific Spaniard Antonio Martinez. A fantastic team move culminated in Ben Johnson having a fantastic crossing opportunity down the right and finding Martinez, whose well-directed header broke the deadlock on 20 minutes.
Martinez almost doubled his tally straight away but his effort from an angle was well stopped by Michael Wood.
Despite this, it wouldn’t take long before the young Hammers did make it two through Martin Samuelsen after another wonderfully worked move.
The Norwegian started the attack with a magnificent infiltrating run into the heart of the box before laying the ball off to Martinez, who unselfishly handed it back to Samuelsen to finish into a partially empty net and double the lead on 29.
However, after looking like we were going to run away with the Game, the starlets were pegged back by Luke Molyneux, as his run and shot slipped under the arm of Nathan Trott. One to forget for the England U20 star.
Nevertheless, the mistake would have no noticeable impact on the outcome of the fixture as chances went begging for both the hosts and the visitors in the second period.
Most notably, Nathan Trott’s handy late double save and Martin Samuelsen’s narrowly wide run and effort, but in the end, we traveled back to East London victorious.
Defeat for The Black Cats roots them to 10th place with five points from their opening six and a Premier League International Cup clash with Hertha Berlin on the horizon.
Whereas, we have now gone level on points with Leicester City and Everton in fourth and third but remain fifth.
Next up for the starlets is the visit of Villarreal to The Chigwell Construction Stadium in that same Competition, how will our Hammer starlets fare in European Competition?
Young Hammer of the Match: Antonio Martinez.
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