Aston Villa Beneath-21s claimed a hard-fought win over Blackpool within the Vertu Trophy on Tuesday night.
An academy facet defeating a senior League One staff — particularly one led by former Villans boss Steve Bruce — is notable sufficient, but it surely’s the tactic of victory that actually caught the attention.
The 2 groups convened at Blackpool’s Bloomfield Street house and performed lengthy into the evening to find out the winner of this spherical of 32 EFL Trophy tie…
Steve Bruce’s Blackpool fall to record-breaking penalty shootout defeat towards Aston Villa academy facet
With the 2 sides having netted one every when the referee sounded the full-time whistle, it was straight to a penalty shootout as customized dictates within the EFL Trophy knockout phases.
Considerably much less customary is requiring a mixed 38 spot-kicks on the evening to find out a winner, with Villa on the suitable facet of the 18-17 scoreline.
The seemingly endless occasion noticed each goalkeepers step up and rating, with most outfield gamers having to take two to discover a winner.
Indicators that there was little to separate the edges got here when Albie Morgan did not convert the Seasiders’ second try, and Villa’s Aidan Borland returned the favour by lacking the very subsequent penalty. Each males scored on their subsequent strive, so it was Jordan Gabriel’s botched try for Blackpool which delivered the long-awaited conclusion to the sport.
It broke the file for probably the most penalties ever taken in a shootout within the English skilled sport, a file solely set earlier this season by Preston North Finish and Fulham of their 34-penalty thriller at Deepdale.
Having kicked off at 19:00 GMT, Blackpool’s official X account posted the ultimate end result virtually two and a half hours later. Time for mattress!
In FourFourTwo’s opinion, Man of the Match has to go to Jordan Gabriel for really managing to separate these two sides together with his missed penalty — they may nonetheless be there now if it wasn’t for him.
EFL Trophy conferences aren’t famend for his or her pleasure, so a nationwide file try positive provides one thing, however our ideas nonetheless exit to those that sat via the whole thing.
