City’s Academy youngsters were back hard at work at the CFA on Thursday with the focus trained on another busy weekend.

Ben Wilkinson’s Under-21s return to Premier League 2 action on Saturday when we travel to tackle West Brom in a game that will be televised live on CITY+ (kick-off 11.30am).

Oliver Reiss’s Under-18s meanwhile are also on the road with our latest Premier League Under-18 North assignment seeing the City youngsters travel to Middlesbrough (kick-off 11am).

Both sides go into the weekend in a rich vein of form with our EDS having won our last five games in all competitions, the latest being Wednesday’s 3-0 UEFA Youth League success against Sparta Prague, with the team also sitting top of PL2 after six games.

Likewise, our Under-18s have also recorded five wins on the bounce and currently lie in third position in the table within striking distance of the top two.

So not surprisingly sprits were high amongst the players and coaching staff as they went about their work on a bright, crisp October day.

View the best of Thursday’s training session in our gallery below…