The Youth Team have made good progress in their recent few games, building on a narrow home defeat to league leaders, QPR, with a point away to Barnet on Saturday and then an excellent 4 - 2 victory on Wednesday at home to Brentford.
For each of these games, and the 1 - 1 draw in a friendly with Stevenage Borough which preceded them, the chance of an extended run in the side to gain invaluable experience at this level have been given to three of the Under 16s Squad which has meant a very young defence of George Cox, Connor Hayes, Sean Calcutt and Aynsley McDonald has taken the field in front of skipper, Joe Day, in goal.
The side defended well throughout the match with QPR, denying the free scoring London side too many chances on goal but a 20 yard strike midway through the second half gave the visitors a 1 - 0 victory.
Next up came a trip to Welwyn Garden City to face a big, physical Barnet side on a poor surface which made getting the ball down and passing it around very difficult against a side who's main attacking threat came from a long throw of one of their Centre Backs.
Rushden took the lead after 21 minutes following a corner which came out to Jake Beecroft on the edge of the box and his strike from 20 yards was diverted into the opposite corner of the net by Alex Phillips.
Barnet drew level in the 69th minute following another long throw which was not cleared and their winger's volley looped into the top corner of Joe Day's goal.
Special mention goes to the performance of Sean Calcutt who was excellent in the centre of the defence against the aerial bombardment from the home side.
The good work from these two games was carried over into the match against Brentford and a superb first half performance saw Rushden- without injured top scorer Sam Smith - race into a 3 - 0 lead with goals from John Wigglesworth, Lewis Hilliard and Anthony Weston.
Brentford rallied at the start of the second half, pulling two goals back before the hour mark but a foul on Alex Phillips led to a penalty that was converted by Ben Nunn to ease the worries and seal a fully deserved victory.
