Southampton’s James Ward-Prowse has dedicated his first senior goal to the Club’s Academy set-up.
The 17 year-old played just over 70 minutes of Saturday’s third round FA Cup tie win at Coventry City and he unsurprisingly highlighted his 63rd minute equaliser as his special moment in front of Saint’s travelling fans.
“They come a long way to watch the team and it’s a great way to repay them,” he told the Club’s website.
“If you can show your support for them on the pitch then they’ll do the same thing for you off it.”
“The FA Cup has got a great history and luckily for me at this Club the youth team is supported right the way through and the first team members also always encourage you and support you. The staff are great too, and you’re made to feel welcome so you can get on with it and play as well as you can.”
Ward-Prowse struck on 63 minutes after showing determination to get on the end of Adam Lallana’s cross at the far post.
“I know Adam’s got a good delivery and I just got in between the two centre halves where luckily I didn’t have too much time to think about it and I got a good connection on it to put it in the back of the net.”
“We had matched them with our set up and it was quite hard for me to get into the game early on, but at half time we got ourselves together and the gaffer got into us a bit, I then found a bit more space and had an opportunity that I should have done better with, but then Adam put in a worldy delivery and fortunately I got on the end of it.”