Callan Hamill believes the FA Youth Cup fourth round against Manchester City ended in a loss due to a lapse in game control during the opening 45 of the affair.
Our under-18s exited the competition after a 5-2 defeat at Joie Stadium on Friday night, with the home side netting a quartet of goals before the interval.
"We're obviously really disappointed to go out of the FA Youth Cup. I just thought in the first half, we didn't compete well enough. We didn't win as many duels and then it's just about game management after we conceded the first goal.
"We conceded another three in the space of 20 minutes, so you can't do that at the highest level and against teams like Manchester City, they'll punish you.
"Fair play to the lads, even though we're 4-1 down, we come out at half-time and we gave it a go. We were more aggressive and got two goals back. But yeah, just really disappointed we're exiting the FA Youth Cup."
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U18s report: Manchester City 5-2 Arsenal](https://www.arsenal.com/fixture/under-18/2026-Jan-16/manchester-city-u18-under-18-match-report?utm_source=arsenaldotcom&utm_medium=embedded-article&utm_campaign=news)
Brando Bailey-Joseph had halved the deficit in the second half, which felt deserved after an improved performance and a clear reaction following the interval team talk.
Callan was honest in his analysis of the two halves and admitted he wanted to see a consistent level of performance shown throughout the full match. "I think we just started far too slow, we gave them too much time to get at us and we just weren't aggressive enough," he said. "The coaches gave us a little kick up the backside at half-time, but it shouldn't need to get to that stage as we should be able to do that from minute one to 90."
The Citizens posed as tough opposition, given their strong domestic form and position at the top of the northern division of the U18 Premier League, but Callan believes our under-18s are more than capable of competing with the best. "You look at them and they're a strong opposition, but you look at us, we're a strong opposition too.
"So no matter what game we go into, we need to be bigger and braver. We're learning from it and hopefully we'll bounce back."
With our FA Youth Cup fate sealed, full focus now turns to finishing as strongly in the league as possible. With plenty of games still to be played, our under-18s have the opportunity to climb the table in the coming weeks, and Callan has set his sights on a positive second half of the campaign.
"I just want to win as many games as possible. Let's not let this game define us, and it won't define the rest of our season.
"We just need to bounce back from this and keep pushing on"
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