Cambridge United hoping to cause an upset in FA Youth Cup against Nottingham Forest

Jimmy Unwin is relishing the prospect of seeing how Cambridge United under-18s rise to the test of facing Nottingham Forest in the last 16 of the FA Youth Cup at the Abbey Stadium tonight (Wednesday, kick off 7pm).

The U’s, who are a Category 3 academy, will be up against Category 1 side for the second round running, but they will be buoyed after their 2-0 defeat of Leeds United last month, when Kai Yearn and Brandon Njoku were on target.

Forest progressed with a 2-1 win at Peterborough United, and have a proud tradition of developing players through their system. Joe Worrall and Brennan Johnson, who both scored in Forest’s 4-1 win over Leicester City in the FA Cup last Sunday, and Ryan Yates, who was also in the starting line-up, were all academy products.

“It’s a big match, a Category 3 academy against a Category 1 again,” said Unwin, United’s professional development phase lead coach.

“Nottingham Forest are a very good club, a massive club, and it will be a good challenge for our boys to try to win another game in the youth cup.

“Forest are well known for bringing through lots of players and they have lost players recently to going abroad and so on.

“They always have players involved with the England set-up so, a bit like Leeds, they have a well-known track record of bringing through their own which is fantastic.”

The draw for this round of the FA Youth Cup had been made prior to the fulfilment of the previous stage’s games, and so Unwin was able to watch Forest’s win over Peterborough.

“I was really impressed with them,” he said.

“They are a really good team, solid, physically strong which you would expect anyway, very well organised, with a good coach. It’s going to be a tough game where we need to be on our mettle from the off.”

But just as in the win over Leeds, the U’s youngsters’ will focus on delivering their own performance as part of another stage of their development.

“We will paint some pictures for the boys of what Forest will be like but we always say it’s about us on the night, what we do, what we execute and what we’re good at and let’s stick to it,” said Unwin.

“That’s the focus within the team and we will give it a good go.

“On the night, I’m sure that there will be some things that happen which might be a bit of adversity that we will have to deal with.

“We’ve had adversity with the Covid for the Leeds game and we’ve got a couple of injuries leading into this one, and whoever is out there is going to have to deal with it and crack on, which will put them in good stead, hopefully, for their careers.”

He added: “It’s a good achievement for this group of young men that have worked ever so hard for the football club and for themselves.

“If we get an opportunity to go one step further it would be fantastic, and a sign of all the hard work that people down the chain have done and that includes Mark Bonner, Tom Pell, the academy manager, Jake Hammond, who has been here a number of years and brought the players up from foundation phase, and the recruitment that’s been done in these groups by Dom Knighton.

“Regardless of if we get through or not, it’s still a great achievement for everyone in the academy.”