Ahead of tonight's FA Youth Cup semi-final with Ipswich Town, Liverpool U18s manager Marc Bridge-Wilkinson has highlighted the fantastic spirit and desire of his players.

The young Reds have so far defeated Sutton United, Manchester United, Leicester City and Arsenal to reach the last four of the prestigious competition.

The four-time winners have netted 15 goals in the Youth Cup and conceded only two, with captain Jarell Quansah and Billy Koumetio leading by example at the heart of the defence.

Bridge-Wilkinson's squad has also been stretched to the limit in attack as key forwards Layton Stewart, Harvey Blair and Oakley Cannonier have missed the whole of the cup run due to injury.

In their absence, Max Woltman, Mateusz Musialowski and James Balagizi have taken centre stage, and the trio were instrumental in the quarter-final win over Arsenal at Anfield.

Read on as Bridge-Wilkinson previews tonight's 6pm BST kick-off…

On the challenge of an FA Youth Cup semi-final…

It's really good and it's something that we've been looking forward to since the last round, and the closer we get to kick-off time the more exciting it is. We have done really well to get to this stage of the competition. All of the group – not just the ones who have played, but the ones as well who have missed out due to injury – they have all played a part in this competition and they have all been brilliant. The training has been really intense and the standard throughout every session has been good.

On the strength of the squad, with players coming in from the U16 group to play key roles so far this season…

It has been really good. The strange thing is, quite often I've not had a lot of decisions to make about the team because injuries came at strange times. For instance, when we lost our left-back James Norris through suspension, we had Luke Chambers back from injury ready to come in. Only recently have we had lots of players being available to select. So it's been a strange and interesting season in terms of injuries, but the competition is fierce.

On getting the chance to play at another first-team stadium in Portman Road…

It's something the lads and the staff are looking forward to. We are looking forward to getting another opportunity to play at a first-team stadium and hopefully we can perform to the level we know we are capable of.

Highlights: The quarter-final win over Arsenal at Anfield

On the challenge posed by Ipswich…

You don't get to this stage of the competition without being a good side and having good players in the group. Ipswich will be tough, they have a good group of players but hopefully – fingers crossed – we can show them how good we are as well.

On what has pleased him the most so far about the run to the last four…

I think it has got to be around the attitude, the character in the group. In all of our games the boys have shown a real willingness and desire to go and achieve something. They work really hard, not just in training but the games as well – on and off the ball. They have a real desire not to lose games of football and ultimately go and score goals. That has been really pleasing and even in moments when we've not played so well, the lads have really stuck to the task and knuckled down in the hard part of the game, the dirty side of the game. We want to perform well on Wednesday night, we want to play well with the football, we want to find a way of threatening their goal and obviously stop them from threatening ours. What that looks like, we have an idea but who knows until the game kicks off.

On U18s winger Kaide Gordon marking his U23s debut with a goal at Leicester City on Monday night…

It was a great experience for Kaide to go and be involved with the U23s and get the goal, so it was really pleasing for him. He's done really well since coming in. We've got to be very cautious and very careful with him that we don't push him too quickly and we don't put him under any pressure that we don't need to. He's definitely showing people what he's capable of and we are really pleased with him.

You can watch the game live on BT Sport in the UK. LFCTV will also provide full match coverage on delay.