Big night for young Clarets

Last updated : 07 December 2012 By Tony Scholes

Last season Burnley defied all the odds to reach the semi-final of the FA Youth Cup having beaten Boston, Ipswich, West Brom and Fulham on the way. We lost the two legged tie against Blackburn and that cost us a first final appearance since 1968.

United fan Jason Gilchrist

Manchester United were the other losing semi-finalists having won it the year before. For them, reaching the semi-finals and final is not a rare event. They are ten time winners of the competition, albeit five of those wins came in the competition's first five seasons from 1953 to 1957.

When Burnley lined up for the semi-final at Ewood Park last season the team consisted of seven second year scholars and four first years. The only substitute used on the night was a fifth first year.

Of those first years, only three of them are able to play in tonight's tie. Jack Errington is recovering from a heart operation, and we are delighted to repeat the earlier news that the operation was a success.

Luke Gallagher is just too old to play in this season's competition and that leaves just Luke Conlan, Cameron Howieson and Jason Gilchrist from last season's team who will be in tonight's squad.

Howieson has already played at Old Trafford, for New Zealand in the Olympics but for Gilchrist, a Manchester United fan who we signed from Manchester City, it is as big a night for him as it will be for any of our players.

Gilchrist is the leading scorer this season. He's scored 16 of our league and cup goals, four times as many as Gallagher who is second in the list. He'll be the one the Clarets will look to for goals.

"I am a United fan," he said this week. "It's always been a dream to play there. I am so looking forward to it and I can't wait to get out there. I don't know what I would do if I scored."

He will have to help provided the experience for the younger players and he added: "Pash always says we have to lead by example and I think we have done that pretty well this year. I think we have helped the younger players in games and I think they have done very well themselves."

The last time a Burnley team played at Old Trafford was in January 2010 in the Premier League. That day, under new manager Brian Laws, Terry Pashley was joined by Martin Dobson on the touchline after they'd taken over the first team following Owen Coyle's departure.

This time Pash will be in charge, alongside Andy Farrell and Craig Mawson. "We will go with the same approach that we did last year," Pash said. "We will try and win the game and try and play football.

"But we are under no illusions. It's going to be very difficult and we will have to defend very well, but you never know."

Burnley are expected to name their team from: Conor Mitchell, Cameron Dummigan, Charlie Holt, Alex Whitmore, Luke Conlan, Evan Galvin, Luke Daly, Nathan Lowe, Lewis Nuttall, Cameron Howieson, Jason Gilchrist, Callum Jakovlevs, Kevin Ly, Bad Jackson, Waqas Azam, Ntumba Massanka, Andreas Bianga, Jamie Frost, Brad Jackson.

Manchester United are having a good season at under-18 level and last Saturday won their latest game in the Barclays Under-18 Premier League against Southampton. The score was 4-2 in United's favour with James Wilson and Mats Daehli both scoring twice.

Wilson was celebrating his 17th birthday. The youngster from Biddulph in Staffordshire is highly rated. He made his youth team debut at the age of 15 and represented England schoolboys. He scored the winning goal against Charlton last season that saw them reach the semi-final.

Norwegian Daehli was much sought after and United won the race for his signature in the summer of 2011. He was the star of that Charlton win and has already signed a professional contract and played for their reserve team.

Three names that might be familiar are Liam Grimshaw, Donald Love and Jack Barmby. Grimshaw is from Burnley, is a Burnley fan with the rest of his family and his Uncle Chris played in our reserve team some years ago. He's been with United since 2002 and can play in any of the defensive positions or in midfield.

Love is the younger brother of Archie who was in our youth team last season. Although from Rochdale, he's played for Scotland at under-17 level and has already been involved with the under-19 team.

The third of those players, Barmby, is the son of former England forward and more recently Hull manager Nicky Barmby. If Jack plays it is likely to be on the left hand side of the attack.

Joe McKee scored in 2010

The United team, who are coached by Paul McGuinness, son of former manager Wilf, lined up for the win against Southampton: Jonny Sutherland, Liam Grimshaw, Declan Dalley, Nicholas Ioannou, Callum Evans, James Weir, Ben Pearson, Jack Rudge, Mats Daehli, Adnan Januzaj, James Wilson. Subs: Joe Rothwell, Jack Barmby, Kenji Gorre, Pierluigi Gollini, Sam Byrne.

Manager Sir Alex Ferguson said: "For 50-odd years, we've been producing young players through the academy system. Barcelona have done the same.

"I don't compare the two, I can only assess my own situation, but in terms of young players coming through I'm very, very pleased. We have a youth team playing on Friday night in the FA Youth Cup and they're absolutely outstanding young players.

"That talent continues because we believe in them and we believe in bringing our own young players through. We have young kids from six years-old right through to academy status. That's been going on a long time and we'll continue that."

The last time the two sides met in the FA Youth Cup was three seasons ago, in January 2010. Burnley had already won at Scunthorpe but the United game, at Turf Moor, proved to be too much and we went down to a 5-1 defeat with Joe McKee scoring our goal.

The teams that night were;

Burnley: Danny McDonald, Ed Williams, Jake McEneaney, Dave Lynch, Tom Anderson, Curtis Woods, Ross Wilson (James Taylor 66), Joe McKee, Dom Knowles, Liam Newman (Joe Jackson 66), Michael King (Stephen Edwards 74). Subs not used: Josh Cooke, Stephen Hewitt.

Manchester United: Conor Devlin, Alberto Massacci (Michele Fornasier 76), Nicholas Ajose, Scott Wootton, Sean McGinty, Ryan Tunnicliffe, Larnell Cole, Paul Pogba, William Keane, Davide Petrucci (Jesse Lingard 67), Josh King (John Cofie 63). Subs not used: Samuel Johnstone, Etzaz Hussain.