Matt Clarke praised by Graham Potter after leading Albion to friendly win

The summer signing from Portsmouth, only 22 himself, skippered an inexperienced team to last night's 1-0 friendly win.

Head coach Graham Potter (third left above) said: "He looks a bit older, doesn't he, without being rude to him.

"You forget that he's not that old but he's played a lot of football. He took responsibility really well and I'm happy for him that he has come through 90 minutes."

Clarke was partnered initially in the centre of defence by Romanian prospect Tudor Baluta (below), who impressed for his country in midfield in the European Under-21s Championships in Italy last month.

Potter told The Argus: "I think he's more comfortable in midfield, but you could see he didn't let himself down at all at the back, just helped us out tactically, played right of the three pretty much.

"You could see his quality, his range of pass, and when he went into midfield you could see what he was about. He's had a busy summer, only a few days with us."

Potter used 18 players in the run-out against Albion's county rivals from League Two. The vast majority were from the under-23s apart from Israeli striker Tomer Hemed (below), who had his first 45 minutes since his loan stint with QPR and summer groin surgery.

Potter said: "It was a good, competitive game, great for the young lads to experience that.

"It's not to easy when you essentially throw a team together and they haven't worked much together.

"Crawley were well organised and you could see that they've been working with some good concepts and it made for a competitive game."