After a breathtaking Thursday night, Manchester United’s U18 side were in action on Friday afternoon, completing an impressive come from behind of their own.
The atmosphere at Old Trafford on Thursday night is something that academy players will be desperate to be a part of in the future. This should serve as motivation for the Manchester United youngsters who will have seen Harry Amass in the thick of the celebrations.
Following the 7-6 aggregate win over Lyon, Ruben Amorim said that he will be using academy players in the Premier League with Europa League taking priority with the league season all but over.
Due to this, the gauntlet has been set for academy players to earn their chance with the opporutnity never being clearer than it is right now.
So on Friday afternoon, as the U18s kept their U18 Premier League title dreams alive with a 4-3 win over Derby County, it was intriguing to see who stood out.
READ: Man Utd under-18s top scorers and assists in 2024/25, all results
Shea Lacey is simply far too good for U18 football
United were 2-0 down to Derby on Friday inside the opening 33 minutes, before Bendito Mantato entered the scoresheet with a big goal, which was assisted by Gabriele Biancheri.
There was then a long wait in the game until the next goal, and it took the introduction of Shea Lacey to ignite a fire in United’s play. Lacey did all the work to create James Scanlon’s equaliser without getting the assist, before he scored a goal of his own to give United the lead.
Derby then equalised before Lacey was key in helping create Victor Musa’s winner.
To have such an incredible impact from the bench despite playing such few minutes this season just showcases that Lacey is far too good for U18 football now, and if he can remain fit there is no reason Amorim won’t be making him an academy graduate this season.
United have taken their time with bringing Lacey back to fitness, and so the perfect way to reward his hard work and end the season on a high would be perfect; he is certainly proving he’s ready.
Shea Lacey sends message after Manchester United U18s win
After his goal and game-changing impact for United, Lacey took to Instagram with a message reacting to the game.
Lacey kept it simple with his message, writing: “Feels good to be back”, before adding a crossed fingers emoji as he clearly is hoping that this time he is back for good.
In the responses, Chido Obi was among those to respond as he wrote: “Yes son”.
Tyler Fletcher added: “Silly player”.
While Mantato said that Lacey was “too good”, which is a statement we can agree with, as he makes youth football look easy. Biancheri also commented, saying: “So back”.
This was agreed upon by Amir Ibragimov, who wrote: “He is back”.
Seeing how supportive Lacey’s teammates are of him getting back to playing is a sign of how highly rated among his peers he is, but also how keen they are for him to get his career back on track.
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