Danny Cowley lauds Portsmouth squad depth as ruthless Blues dismantle Aston Villa under-21s

The Blues head coach was able to make 10 changes to the side which lost 3-2 at Ipswich on Saturday, with only Sean Raggett retained in the starting XI.

The outcome was a 5-0 thumping of Villa’s kids in the Papa John's Trophy, with Ronan Curtis opening the scoring after just 67 seconds.

Michael Jacobs, Josh Koroma (two) and Reeco Hackett completed the rout, with Cowley afterwards disappointed the Blues didn’t bag even more.

Regardless, Pompey’s boss was delighted with the performance of a team which included a number of fringe players such as Ryan Tunnicliffe, Kieron Freeman, Jay Mingi, Zak Swanson, Denver Hume and Josh Oluwayemi.

And he believes it bodes well for the first-team in their latest bid to escape League One.

Cowley told The News: ‘I’m pleased with the attitude and work ethic of the group.

‘We wanted to play with enthusiasm, energy and intensity – and I thought we did that the first time we got the ball.

‘This is really helpful for the squad, the group that didn’t play trained and were all there this evening cheering the boys on that didn’t play.

‘That’s really important, there’s a good energy and a good spirit within the group.

‘We are a team used to winning and likes winning, so when you come up short on Saturday, you want to try to put that right at the earliest possible opportunity – and we were able to do that.

‘It was a good performance, it says that the boys are in a good place, there’s a lot of players in the group that are ready when called upon.

‘There were some really good things, when you look at the team, young Josh (Oluwayemi), Zak Swanson is young, Jay Mingi is young, we had boys who came on from the Academy, Adam Payce played again.

‘At the end of the game we had six or seven aged 21 or under, which bodes well for the future.

‘We have a really nice balance, 12 who are young and hungry and on their way up and improving by the day, plus we’ve got some really, really good senior players that are supporting the young players.

‘There's definitely a nice balance, there’s a nice spirit, they all want each other to do well, which is important.’

Koroma was introduced after 34 minutes, with Joe Pigott going off, and responded by bagging twice in the second half.

While in Michael Jacobs, the Blues had the outstanding player on the night, who was involved in everything good about their display.

Cowley added: ‘We got some more minutes into some who needed it.

‘Denver (Hume) did well, he put in some good crosses in the first half, and Michael Jacobs gives us that little bit of flair and creativity, I lost count of the amount of assists he had.

‘Probably my only criticism was we should have been more ruthless. In 15 years of football, I don’t remember being as dominant in the game as we were.’