Blyth Spartans 1 Corby Town 1 (Match Reaction)

According to Blyth Spartans' manager Mick Tait his side's first point of the season came from their worst performance to date.

Saturday's home game against Corby saw Blyth struggle back in a dour game to claim a 1-1 draw in the dying moments. However they could have clinched all three points as following the 88th minute equaliser the Spartans spurned chances with Dan Groves firing wide and Stephen Harrison rushing his shot which was safely collected by Corby keeper Chris Mackenzie.

"A win for us would have been a steal," commented Tait after the game.
"We did little until the final ten minutes and weren't really playing well enough to get back into the game," he continued. "We've been giving poor goals away in all our games so far and we did so again on Saturday. We should have complained when Corby pinched 15 yards for a throw in which lead to their goal. Taken in the correct place it would have been much more defendable. The goal changed the game. We have to become mentally stronger because as in the other games, we stop playing when we go behind. We have the players to cope with that but we're not seeing it at the moment.
"We've got to try and improve, toughen up and handle these kind of things. And we will."

Ben Mackey put the visitors ahead in the 24th minute driving the ball high into the net with Spartans debutant keeper Jake Cunningham helpless.
The second half saw Corby dominate and Blyth using three substitutes in an effort to reinvigorate their performance. Stirring defensive work kept the hosts in the game and Tait took this as the only really positive to come out of the game.
"We did well to keep it at 1-0. We defended well as a unit against numerous balls into our penalty box. If we'd conceded again we would have struggled to get anything but we kept ourselves in with a shout and set up the final ten minutes when we could go at them."

Cunningham had replaced Sam Grieveson in the Blyth goal after the former Norwich City player had been advised by a Doctor not to take part in any physical activity for three days following an infected insect bite on the calf, which he picked up late last week.
In fact Cunningham had little to do such were the rousing efforts being made by those in front of him.

Tait introduced forward John Alexander for Robbie Dale with 20 minutes remaining.
"John gave us a little spark," said Tait. "He is a different sort of player who stretched their defence and threatened them from in behind. Corby had to drop off a bit to deal with him and that gave us more space to play."

The Blyth goal, when it came, was a sweet one. Centre back Wayne Buchanan laid off the ball to Calvin Smith who drilled a pass forward to Paul Brayson 25 yards from goal. The striker appeared to be looking to shoot but instead rolled the ball to the on-rushing Stephen Turnbull who thundered the ball high into the top corner of the net.

The goal saw Blyth 'get out of jail' and minutes later the Groves and Harrison chances went begging but any winner for the Spartans would arguably have been daylight robbery.