Manchester City youngster Liam Delap smashed in a hat-trick against Everton Under-18s as the academy teams prepare for the start of the new season.
Youth football was curtailed in March as a result of the pandemic but the club's youngsters are back at the City Football Academy getting ready to begin a new campaign as well as having their efforts recognised for last year by the academy coaches.
Delap, a powerful and speedy forward, has made an excellent impression since joining the Blues last year. He was bumped up to play Under-19 and Under-23 football before the end of the season and also trained with Pep Guardiola's first team in the build-up to their Champions League mini-tournament in Lisbon.
Phil Foden and others have shown that first-team opportunities have to be earned with plenty of patience needed and the 17-year-old striker is not expected to be challenging Sergio Aguero and Gabriel Jesus for a place in the team in the immediate future.
However, all he can do is keep impressing at whatever level he plays and he enjoyed himself at the weekend with one of his three goals in particular drawing praise. Already over six foot, Delap may not fit the typical bill of a City or Guardiola striker but that may not work against his first-team ambitions.
"In the past you look at City's strikers and they're small and technical but I think I'm just a different player," he told MEN Sport earlier this year. "It works well for me because I am different and I can show myself even more. It's good.
"I've always looked up to Cristiano Ronaldo. Just the way he plays, the pace and the power. For me, he's the best in the world so aspiring to someone who is the best in the world, your dreams just have to be high.
"Listening to people that he's worked with, the extras and lengths that he goes to look after his body and get better every day just shows why he's at the top level. You can have talent but talent on its own doesn't work without effort."
