Nathan Redmond was the star performer in today's defeat for Blues Reserves.

Blues Reserves went down to two late goals in a behind-closed-doors friendly at Wolves earlier this afternoon.

Richard Beale's side bossed the first half and went close on numerous occasions, notably two long-range efforts from Nathan Redmond, one of which brought a fingertip save from the home keeper, and a shot from Akwasi Asante that crashed back off the crossbar.

But unfortunately the visiting team made up of young professionals, scholars and trialists couldn't maintain that same high standard in the second half and numerous changes in personnel seemed to disrupt their rhythm after the interval.

A Sam Winnall penalty nine minutes from the end for the hosts followed by Johnny Gorman's stoppage time strike did the damage during the closing stages.

"It was a proverbial game of two halves," admitted reserve team boss Beale. "We started the game brightly and gave a good account of ourselves, moving the ball well and creating some chances.

"We made a few substitutions early in the second half and couldn't get going from there, which was disappointing having begun the game so well."

Enric Valles made his return to action for the first time for several months following a long spell out through injury and came through an hour of the contest unscathed.

"Technically he showed some good stuff, he has a sweet left foot so it was good to see him back," commented Beale.

And young winger Redmond yet again caught the eye, with Beale adding: "It was good to see Nathan running at the Wolves defence and really causing them some problems on the left wing.

"He was brought down a number of times for fouls because of his silky skills so I was really pleased for Nathan to get a good 90 minutes under his belt, which was crucial."

Richard Beale was disappointed with his side's second half showing at Wolves.

But ultimately it was a bitter-sweet afternoon for the reserve team boss.

Beale felt that some of his young players had failed to repeat the kind of display that had seen them claim a highly creditable goalless draw at Manchester United a fortnight ago.

"It's no good playing really well and drawing at Manchester United and then only playing for half of the game this week," he stressed.

"If they want to progress to the first team then they need to perform consistently, day in and day out, week in and week out, in training and in games.

"Some of our players can reach those levels on a one-off but can't reproduce them and ultimately that's the difference between making it and not making it.

"That could be a mental thing, technical, physical or game understanding, but they have to learn and we facilitate that as coaches and the staff at the club.

"We talk to them and analyse the match. It's then up to them to take that information on board, absorb it and transfer that into their game to make themselves better."

Blues: Trialist; Graham Hutchinson, Fraser Kerr, Trialist (James Fry 70), Jack Deaman; Luke Hubbins (Trialist 65), Enric Valles (Brice Ntambwe 60), Trialist (Josh Hawker 60), Nathan Redmond; Eddy Gnahore, Akwasi Asante.