Ryan Taylor won praise from the Pompey management after a two-goal showing for the reserves that spoke of his desire to return to the first team at York this weekend.

The marksman put away two headers in the reserves' 3-1 win at Cheltenham and second string chief Alan McLoughlin said he was delighted with the display of Ryan Taylor, and the likes of Adam Webster and Conor Chaplin.

McLoughlin told the PFC website: 'If you get the right service in for Ryan, then that’s what he’s all about. He arrived at the back post with two great headers and the first saw us off to a great start.

'It was also really pleasing to see so many youth players involved in the starting line-up and coming off the bench. They’re making good progress and could learn alongside guys like Adam Webster and Ryan,' said the coach.

'Cheltenham played with quite an unusual system, but in these games there’s no use instantly telling the players where they need to go. It’s a learning process and we wanted them to work it out for themselves with a little bit of guidance from us.

'Then when half-time comes we can really nail it down to the players about what we want from them. We didn’t change our system. We counter-attacked and in the second half we were mostly in control. It was a deserved victory and we always ask our teams to win games at any level because we want to get that winning mentality running throughout the club.'

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