Toolstation Western League Premier Division
Bridgwater Town 2, Buckland Athletic 0

A GOAL in each half from Jake Llewellyn gave Bridgwater all three points from their opening Premier Division game at Fairfax Park on Tuesday night which ended in pure farce, writes Kerry Miller.

Substitute Ian Bellinger possibly made history right at the death as he was sent off seconds after coming on to replace Jack Taylor, who himself was replaced after a confrontation which saw him and Buckland’s Jamie Richards booked when the opposition were screaming for a red card.

Bellinger walked onto the pitch and appeared to deliberately walk into Richards provoking yet another skirmish as he was dismissed before the game had even restarted.

The home pitch was hard and uneven but perfectly playable after much grafting from the ground staff and with Buckland never really getting out of second gear it didn’t take very long for the teams to decide they weren’t overly keen on each other.

Buckland’s match set up was thrown out of kilter after less than 20 minutes when Danny Griffiths limped off and, other than a couple of long throws into the box from the Robins, very little happened until Dave Thorne escaped down the right and his wicked low cross was missed by everyone.

On the half hour they took the lead when player-boss Dave Pearse and Taylor linked and his fine cross found Llewellyn on the far post and he nodded home with keeper Dom Aplin helpless.

By then tackles were flying in and, with accusations of errant elbows from both sides, referee Richard Lawrence lost patience as too many free-kicks and too much testosterone threatened to dominate the game.

Buckland player-manager Craig Duff set up Richard Groves who drove wide, their first shot in the game, before Duff escaped and brought a save out of Jake Viney just on the break.

What had been a largely uneventful first half came to live with a vengeance from the restart as Les Afful drove over before the Robins went two up and all but wrapped up the game on 55 minutes.

Taylor had lobbed wide seconds earlier but from a corner Buckland did not clear their lines and Llewelyn smashed it home from 20 yards out.

The Buckland keeper kept out a Lee Bugg drive late on, then Llewelyn set up Sam Towler who volleyed just wide which set up the bizarre ending.

Taylor and Richards clashed in the area, the latest in several confrontations, with Taylor accused of a head butt.

He was immediately substituted for Bellinger, who trotted on to pitch straight into Richards, with yet another skirmish opening up as he was shown a straight red, no more than 15 seconds after coming on and without the match restarting.

Next up for Bridgwater is the FA Cup extra-preliminary round tie at First Division Cheddar on Saturday.