MORTON Director of Youth Derek Anderson believes that the future is bright as his under-17 academy side gear up for their semi final against Dundee at Notre Dame on Sunday morning.

The Ton youngsters topped the south-west section of their competition this season, scoring 43 goals in ten games.

Anderson hopes that his side can continue to kick on, after they won their league last term to qualify for the tournament.

He told the Tele: “The boys won ten games out of ten, so they’ve done really well.

“They’ve played against Ayr, Livingston, Falkirk, Partick and Queen of the South and not lost a game - it’s amazing.

“In the other section you’ve got St Johnstone, Montrose, Dundee, Dunfermline Athletic, Alloa, Stirling and Elgin.

“St Johnstone topped it, so they play Ayr in the other semi final. And if we beat Dundee on Sunday morning then we’ll play the winner of that game at Ochilview the following week.

“It would be good to build on the league success that the group had last year. It would top things off quite nicely for them.

“They’re showing they’re a special group. They genuinely are a good group and I think that the key to achieving that is by getting them together at a young age, keeping them together and letting them grow.

“A lot of them have played alongside each other from a young age and stuck together.

“They’ve got a fantastic attitude and ten of them were up in Dingwall the other week with the under-18s playing against Ross County.

“We can’t hold them back, they’re playing in that team now and getting experience before making the step up.

“The fact that they’re doing this so early is promising, it shows that every single one of them have potential.

“But that’s all it is just now is potential. We need to keep their feet on the ground because it's up to them to see how far they can go.”

Anderson believes that the young guns are showing no fear and that they won’t be letting up anytime soon as they prepare to make the step up to U18 level.

The honours keep rolling in for the side after two of their standouts received call ups to the Scotland Schools team last month.

He said: “We had two of our boys, Jayden McGivern and Matthew Davidson, called up to the national squad.

“They’ll now move to the 18s next year and they’ll be a young team.

“We’re only going to have four who are second years and the rest will be made up of the current group that we’ve got just now.

“And we’re looking for them to be challenging, so its really exciting times for them.”