AdminLuton’s defender Teden Mengi played his second game for the England U21 team in a rather energetic match that ended in a 1-1 draw with the Netherlands U21 in Almere on Monday night.
Mengi who had been on the bench as a substitute in the barren affair against the Spanish U21 side again watched the game from the bench at the Yanmar Stadium. The Young Lions started brightly for what was also Ben Futcher’s last game in charge, Tottenham Hotspur’s Dane Scarlett on loan from Oxford United to convert a diving header from Samuel Iling-Junior to give England the 1st goal.
The Dutch side began to step up into the match and put pressure on the English side with their wide players. Goalkeeper James Beadle was able to prevent this when he leapt to block a header by Ezechiel Banzuzi and followed in coolly to take a shot from Myron van Brederode away from the goal. This proved to be the story as the first half went on, with Ryan Flamingo coming close to equalizing for his team but his shot just went off the crossbar leaving England in the lead going into halftime.
In the second half the English James McAtee was able to enter before Beadle managed to prevent Banzuzi from shooting during the long range while Mengi joined the game replacing Charlie Cresswel just before the final fiftieth minutes. Mengi’s entrance made the difference as he cleared the danger before Mujanga could relay the ball to Gjivai Zechiël.
However, try as England did, the equaliser was landed towards the end of the second half by Thom van Bergen from Million Manhoef. The Birmingham based shot stopper, currently on loan at Sheffield Wednesday, produced a memorable match display and close range saves to prevent Dutch triumph. England came very close to clinching the victory in the match when Aston Villa’s Jayden Philogene took his shot but it went wide.
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