Youth lads playing non-league football

Joe Booth - playing in the Unibond for Fleetwood

Quite often the players released at youth level disappear without trace and so we have been trying to find out if they are still playing football and if so where, and Fleetwood was the obvious place to start with those three players all having signed for the club who play their home games at Highbury.

All three are doing well and Hale is pushing hard for a starting place, currently held by former Bury and Morecambe goalkeeper Andy Banks.

We need to go further north to find striker Alex Taylor, having been released at the end of last season he signed for Conference North club Lancaster City. They are in the top half of the table and last season’s leading youth team scorer has been amongst the goals.

Tom Ince is playing his football in the same league as the lads at Fleetwood, he’s with Bamber Bridge who are currently in mid-table. Tom will have a date with his old mates next Month when Bamber Bridge visit Fleetwood.

Adam Jones returned to Wales and is currently in the reserve team at Rhyl. Adam, who fought back from a cruciate ligament injury at Burnley, is doing well and recently had the opportunity of playing at Newtown, Andy Cooke’s former club, on loan.

That just leaves the central defensive pairing of Neal Trotman and Ryan Townsend. We did hear that Neal was at Oldham but that is not confirmed whilst Ryan has joined Newcastle, that is Newcastle back in Australia his adopted country, for whom he won international honours in the summer.

As for the first team players released, there is still no news of Jean-Louis Valois getting a club although news has surfaced today that Tony Grant is training with Crewe but it looks unlikely that he will be offered a deal by Dario G.

There's no news either on Paul Scott but Matt O'Neill, having signed for Accrington Stanley, is currently on loan with Radcliffe Borough and Joel Pilkington is now with Mossley having initially joined Hyde.