U18s: Dickman pleased with fightback

Elliott Dickman praised Sunderland's under-18s after they came from a goal behind to clinch a point against Leicester City in the Barclays U18 Premier League.

Andrew Nelson fired the young Black Cats level in the 86th minute with a fine strike after Layton Nwukwu had given the Foxes a break-away lead.

Sunderland then had chances to win the game, and will feel aggrieved they didn’t, as Elliot Embleton and Dan Pybus spurned good opportunities

“We played well but at times we need to take a bit more care in and around the final third,” Dickman said.

“We created some good chances and got into some good positions but if we had taken a bit more time in the final third maybe we could’ve won the game.

“Elliot Embleton was terrific so was Andrew Nelson, he works so hard and I love that about his game, I wouldn’t like to play against him because I can imagine he would be a real handful.”

Sunderland were the better team throughout but Leicester capitalised on sloppy play from the Lads and snatched a shock lead in the 63rd minute.

Pybus then saw his spot-kick saved by Max Bramley before Nelson deservedly earned Sunderland a share of the spoils with an excellent drilled finish from 18 yards.

The result means Dickman’s side have extended their unbeaten run to three games and keeps alive their hopes of finishing top of the group two play-offs.

“It was frustrating at times because we did play some excellent stuff but we showed good character to get back into the match and maybe we could’ve gone on to win it.”