{"id":638960,"date":"2026-04-29T19:19:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-29T19:19:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/638960\/"},"modified":"2026-04-29T19:19:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-29T19:19:10","slug":"mcevoy-double-and-gabriel-brace-cut-manchester-city-lead-in-title-race","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/638960\/","title":{"rendered":"McEvoy double and Gabriel brace cut Manchester City lead in title race"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<img width=\"1200\" height=\"675\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Untitled-design_20260429_172942_0000.png\" class=\"attachment- size- wp-post-image\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" fetchpriority=\"high\"  \/>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>Manchester United U18s returned to winning ways in the U18 Premier League North on Wednesday afternoon after <a href=\"https:\/\/www.manutd.com\/en\/news\/detail\/u18s-match-report-from-man-utd-vs-liverpool-in-u18-premier-league\" title=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">beating Liverpool 4-1 <\/a>at Carrington.<\/p>\n<p>United have reduced Manchester City\u2019s lead at the top of the table to three points, though the Cityzens have a game in hand.<\/p>\n<p>Top scorer JJ Gabriel returned to the team after missing the <a href=\"https:\/\/manutdnews.com\/sunderland-u18s-2-1-man-united-ajayis-missed-penal\" title=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">defeat at Sunderland<\/a>. He scored a brace to continue his brilliant form.<\/p>\n<p>United got off to a bright start with Noah Ajayi squaring the ball across the face of goal to Louie Bradbury, whose effort sailed wide.<\/p>\n<p>The young Reds went ahead in the 18th minute. Rafe McCormack picked out Nathaniel-Junior Brown, who teed up Jay McEvoy to apply the finish.<\/p>\n<p>McEvoy then assumed defensive duties, stopping La\u2019more Lee Forrester in his tracks.<\/p>\n<p>The 17-year-old doubled United\u2019s lead on the half-hour mark, after playing a one-two with Jim Thwaites. He then opened up his body to fire past goalkeeper Bailey Hall.<\/p>\n<p>The visitors finished the first half strongly, with Lee Forrester curling wide before AJ Yeguo failed to hit the target from a promising position.<\/p>\n<p>McEvoy came close to extending United\u2019s tally just after the break, but this time, Hall was equal to the task.<\/p>\n<p>Liverpool halved the deficit in the 63rd minute when United failed to deal with a corner, allowing Joe Bradshaw to tap the ball into an empty net.<\/p>\n<p>In the 83rd minute, Gabriel ended the visitors\u2019 hopes of staging a comeback, beating Hall from the penalty spot. <\/p>\n<p>Moments later, he sealed the victory, running through on goal to net his 25th goal of the campaign.<\/p>\n<p>United will aim to keep applying the pressure on City when they travel to Newcastle United on Saturday.<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/manutdnews-250x50-1.png\" class=\"lazyload\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 250px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 250\/50;\"\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Manchester United U18s returned to winning ways in the U18 Premier League North on Wednesday afternoon after beating&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":638961,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-638960","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=638960"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638960\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/638961"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=638960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=638960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=638960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}