Jon De Souza felt Brentford and Swansea City deserved to share the spoils after Saturday’s Under-18 Professional Development League Two South match at Jersey Road.
It was The Swans who struck first in the match between the league leading Bees and the fourth placed visitors as Owain Jones slammed home from 18 yards just after the hour mark.
The visitors missed two glorious chances to double their advantage soon after and were made to pay as Bradley Clayton popped up in the 97th minute to poke home and ensure a fourth game without defeat for Jon De Souza’s side.
Speaking to Bees Player after the match Jon said: “Overall I think a point was a fair result.
“We sat here two weeks ago and I felt that the in the game against QPR we dominated it without controlling it, it was probably the opposite today.
“I thought we controlled the game for long periods today without ever dominating.
“For me if you dominate a game of football you create chances and that was one big thing we lacked today.
“To be fair to them they created a lot of chances.
“For me we controlled the game because for long periods of time we had possession.
“We dominated the ball without ever creating chances.
“When they got the ball they were quite direct but they did give the ball away a lot.
“When they got at us they got at us with real quality and created chances which is why, overall, you would probably say a draw was a fair result, although they were more of a threat to our goal than we were to theirs.”
Swansea were looking to become the first side this season to do the double over The Bees following their 4-1 win in South Wales back in December.
On that occasion Brentford were unable to handle the pace and direct running of Swansea’s front three of Stephen Fallon, Owain Jones and Daniel James.
Jon said that the attacking threat of The Swans posed a real threat to The Bees especially as his side needed to come out and play after falling behind.
However the Youth Team manager felt it was still important for his side to try and impose their style on the game and not to worry overly about the threat posed by their opponents.
“Their front three were a real handful,” said Jon.
“I hope people don’t take the directness in the wrong way because they weren’t booting it; they were clear and concise in the Real Madrid way.
“They ran at people, had forward runners and were a good side.
“I thought it was going to be difficult the way the game was going because when they went 1-0 up they sat off, let us have the football and you could see they were trying to get us on the counter.
“When it went 1-0 to them they had two or three real chances to punish us.
“They missed some glorious chances but all credit to our players; they showed a lot of patience and quality and scored a really good goal.
“We tried not to do anything different.
“When you drop off you don’t take the game by the front foot.
“The way the club likes to play is to take the game by the front foot.
“We wanted to continue to play with that risk but all I said to the players was that they would only score if we gave the football away.
“I told them not to give the football away and secondly we had to recover quickly.
“That was how we tried to counter what they did.
“We didn’t want to drop off because that would stop us being on the front foot.”
The Swans goal came at the end of a 10 minute period where it looked inevitable that they would find the back of the net.
Jones had been denied by a vital last ditch tackle from Seth Owens, Aaron Lewis had struck a post and Daniel James shot over an open goal before Jones did finally find the back of the net.
Jon admitted that he was very disappointed with how the team played in that period as he felt negativity crept into his team’s game.
However he was pleased with how the team recovered from the set back and got back to earn a draw in what Jon described as a cup tie finish between two sides desperate to win.
“I was disappointed with the players’ negativity,” said Jon.
“One or two players started to moan at each other and moan at things.
“For the 10 minutes before we conceded we were very negative towards each other.
“When we conceded I was worried about how we would react but we managed to get together and get some positivity back.
“For me we conceded because we were negative, not with what we did but with how we spoke to each other.
“As disappointed as I was with our attitude when we conceded I was delighted with our application and how we came back.
“We showed a lot of character and quality.
“It feels like a win for the players and rightly so because they did well.
“All credit to both sides because with where they are in the league it was like a cup tie.
“It is good for the players’ development because it is not all about winning but about learning how to win games.
“When they went 1-0 up they sat in and they were desperate to get the three points and we were desperate to get back into the game.
“That is a great learning curve for the players because next week when we play Colchester United I am not sure the game will have the same dynamic as it had on Saturday.
“You could see from our reaction and their reaction how much it meant to both teams.
“Last week we scored a 89th minute winner and this week we scored a 97th minute equaliser and that is what you need.”
Next up for The Bees is a home game against Colchester United at Jersey Road next Saturday.
The Us beat Brentford 5-3 in the first game after Christmas and Jon believes that The Bees desire not to let any side do the double over them will give them a little extra motivation ahead of next week’s fixture.
“It was a strange game at Colchester United and ultimately they deserved to win as we were poor in both boxes,” said Jon.
“So far this season I don’t think any team has beaten us twice this season, Swansea would have been the first, so we will look to get something out of the game.
“There are all little motivations going into games and them beating us at their place is another one.
“For us we need to be motivated every day to train and in every game we play.
“The fact that we are where we are in the league adds a little carrot but we want the players to be motivated to break into our first team.”