Manchester City haven't had much luck in the UEFA Youth League in recent seasons, but their head coach has spotted a new hunger in the academy that could bode well this year.
City haven't passed the group stage since 2018, although one of those years saw the competition cancelled, and the Blues' best crop of academy talents have passed through the under-19s and under-23s without making a mark on the biggest club tournament in Europe.
This season though, even without the likes of Cole Palmer, James McAtee, Liam Delap or Tommy Doyle, the youngsters at City are looking to use the Youth League as a competition to show they are as good as the players who have gone before them.
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City weren't at their best on Wednesday against a well-organised FC Copenhagen side, but showed a spirit and desire that impressed head coach Brian Barry-Murphy to come from behind and salvage something in the last minute for the second game running. After breezing past Sevilla in Spain, City scored in the 90th and 92nd minutes against Borussia Dortmund to win 3-2 and go top of the group, level with Copenhagen on six points.
This week, Copenhagen looked like edging a tight game 1-0, but Joel Ndala fired home in the 92nd minute to earn a deserved point after he scored the late winner vs Dortmund in the previous game. And Barry-Murphy says this year's squad are showing the kind of desire and attitude that gives him a belief that they can always come back in games, something that will be key if they are to be successful in Europe this season.
He told MEN Sport: "When we were losing in the in the game, it would have been easy to get really anxious and to be impatient, but I thought were quite patient in the way we played in the final third. And then you're looking for a moment of individual skill and we found quite a few of those. I thought at the end, I know it probably sounds ridiculous that we could have won the game, but we had all those chances that we had against Dortmund, and that's testament to the players.
"You speak a lot about keeping going to the end and creating the team spirit. But to give that real feeling of substance or something intuitive, it has to actually happen every now and again. So once it happens once or twice, or quite a few times here. You tend to believe that it does work for you. So there's a lot of substance what we speak of."
"Previously our experience in Champions League [Youth League] have been quite mixed. The first year I came in it was a lot of talk about, it's not really good competition, but the players we work with now are very excited by it and always believe they are going to get a chance.
"I think if we're going to be successful in this group will have to overcome quite a lot of different hurdles and it's already been the case so far and will have to be the case for the rest of the group stage."
One of City's standout players on Wednesday was midfielder Kian Breckin, who has stepped up this year after more senior midfielders have departed. Despite picking up an early booking, Breckin continued to get stuck in and helped drive City forward in a game where the opposition gave little space in behind.
"We're all really happy," he said. "We fought as a team, so just glad to get a point, and on another day we could have won. We just tried to create chances and make runs in behind trying to disrupt their backline and in the end it paid off.
"I think these experiences build character. Because when it's tough games and you fight and you get a point and it can be rewarding. It just gives you more experience as a player when you progress, helps you throughout you career."
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