Cheetahs win Evergreen Youth tournament

Adam Mason’s brace in the final sinks Abbots Youth

The Knebworth Youth U11 Cheetahs have finished off the season in fine style after a hat-trick of tournament victories.

It began with the Bedford Park 11-a-side event three weeks ago where they were crowned champions competing against some excellent teams from across Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire.

This was followed up last week at the Evergreen Youth tournament where they were unbeaten all day, playing against strong teams from the west of the region.

And then on Saturday it was the Knebworth Youth tournament and the competition could not have been tougher with two league champions amongst the entries as well as many teams playing top flight football in their respective leagues.

The Cheetahs, with several new faces in the squad, are starting to look a formidable outfit and they qualified from their group in this last tournament as winners after winning four games and drawing just one, with no goals conceded.

In the semi-final they took on the RCYFL U11 Champions Arlesey Town Youth but never looked troubled after Leon Okuboyejo opened the scoring in the first half. Sam Swain wrapped up the victory after intercepting a poor throw from the Arlesey goalkeeper and lobbing him from outside the area.

This victory would pitch the Knebworth side against Bushmead Rovers, runaway winners of the Chiltern U11 League and also reigning champions from the Knebworth Tournament, in the final.

Adam Mason linked up well with Swain to smash the ball in from an impossible wide angle early in the game to settle the Cheetahs and then Jeffrey Worifah pounced on two clever through balls (from Swain and Taylor Wilson) to increase the lead in the second half and the Cheetahs looking unstoppable at 3-0. Sam Swain wrapped up the game with a fourth goal near the end and that makes it 17 titles from under-six to under-11 age groups for this talented group of footballers.