Smith stars as Buckland Athletic survive a scare

RYAN Smith put in a “tremendous” performance on his second debut for Buckland Athletic; facing former side Ivybridge Town, and scoring the winner as part of a dramatic finale.

The Bucks looked to be cruising at The VX3 Stadium with 15 minutes left, having weather the Ivybridge storm from the first half, only to ship two goals within minutes of each other.

“At 2-2, we were probably worried about then losing the game” admitted manager Matt Cusack but Smith was on hand to convert a decisive fifth goal of the evening.

Buckland have been known to make swift starts and that was the case once more, Myles James pulling it back for Isaac McCue to open the scoring on seven minutes.

With half an hour gone, Josiah McKayle picked out the bottom corner from an extremely acute angle to double the advantage, having been played through well by Smith.

Mike Searle’s goal was under fire at the other end between the two goals though- he fumbled the ball straight to Kaycee Ogwu who couldn’t get enough power on his header and then there were a slew of set-pieces.

There was a customary caution for Bucks skipper Ben Carter when he went flying into a sliding tackle.

Ivybridge had the final opportunity of the first half, Ogwu’s sliced effort clanging the woodwork with Buckland eventually able to scramble it away.

It was a really watchable game before the break but after it, for a good 20 minutes at least, the evening passed by with little to report on.

Both sides turned to their substitutes, Cusack first sending on Jamie Simmonds and Toby Pullman for Jack Baxter and McKayle before replacing McCue and Carter with Kai Swann and Frankie Jones.

There were signs of tensions rising, Ivies manager Ben Washam being shown a yellow for something said to the ref and Pullman following him into the book after leaving one in on Joe Cook.

When it looked as if the game was petering out, Ogwu finally grabbed his goal, timing the run perfectly and heading home from Ryan Geach’s cross.

Out of the blue, Ivybridge were then back on level terms and this was the strike of the night.

Rafa Beadman caught Ivies captain James Forrest but the visitors used the advantage well, Owen Howard drilling the ball into the top corner against a now “shell shocked” Buckland.

Cusack’s last roll of the dice saw Jordan Pearce take the place of Danny Frankum and this alteration, moving into a back-three, “Stopped them at one end and gave us the platform to go and get the winner at the other.”

Fin Herbert, who enjoyed another impressive outing for the club, beat a couple of men on the right flank before sending Simmonds to the byline who squared it back for Smith to wrestle back the initiative on his return to Homers Heath.

Smith “was brought into the club because he’s a big moments player, we saw that playing against him a few weeks ago.”

Cusack continued: “He’s someone that I’ve worked with before (at Helston Athletic) and he’s matured in that time, he’s impacting games of football regularly now.

“What a debut, to pop up and score a last-minute winner, you can’t ask for much more than that.”

Some of the substitutions coincided with Ivybridge’s revival in the game, with Cusack avowing: “I thought I might have got it wrong but we’ve had lads play a lot of football.”

On the flipside, Simmonds made a telling contribution from the bench with Cusack shining the spotlight on him.

He said: “We wanted to manage his minutes and ease him back in gradually, he’s come on and impacted games regularly but his hamstring has gone again, about six weeks after he did it at Newquay.

“Simmo stayed on the pitch and actually set up the winner for Ryan so I want to pay tribute to him because it would have been easy for him to leave the field of play and, from a medical perspective, he probably should have. It might have added a week or so onto his recovery but by doing that, he’s earned us three points.”

At the end of the day, Cusack was “delighted to get over the line” but “I didn’t feel like we did enough in the second half. I praised us on Saturday about playing well in both halves of football but today we didn’t.”

The games continue to come thick and fast as Buckland travel to face Wells City on Saturday, October 17.