SHOLING captain Joel Drew was left encouraged by his side’s resilient display against Newport County in the first round of the FA Youth Cup on Tuesday.

The Boatmen took the Welsh side to penalties after holding firm at 0-0 for 120 minutes, but were defeated 4-2 on spot kicks after missing twice, writes Danny Maiorca.

Sholing’s senior side are in the Sydenhams Wessex Premier, five divisions below The Exiles who are a League Two outfit.

Newport will face Southend United in the second round and, despite seeing his team’s cup run end in disappointment, Drew was proud of their efforts.

“They’re a League Two side. We did very well to take them all the way to penalties and they weren’t expecting that,” the midfielder said.

“We had chances to win the game. We were unlucky in the end.”

“Everyone was excellent, especially Kieran (Winman) the centre back.”

Drew came within inches of grabbing a major scalp for the hosts, forcing a fine save from visiting goalkeeper Rhys Davies with seconds to go in extra time.

Some of the visitors’ players have already featured in League Two for County this season, including midfielder Lewis Bamford.

Drew felt that matching such strong opposition was a learning curve for his teammates: “Hopefully we can take this and the experiences we have all gained tonight into the under-18s league and win that too.”

Meanwhile, striker Nick Yeomans felt it was fair for the tie to be decided via a shootout after an even two hours of football.

“We had opportunities and so did they, it could have gone either way,” the young forward said.

“For it to be decided on penalties was a fair result.”

“We came here tonight as underdogs and gave them everything we had, so it’s all positives.”