Kingstonian manager Leigh Dynan is proving himself a master of the loan market after his latest young recruit, Ben Dempsey, turned in a fine display in a 4-1 win at home to Bognor Regis on Saturday, writes Taimour Lay.
The 19-year-old central midfielder has arrived from League One Charlton Athletic, for whom he appeared in the Carabao Cup in August.
“I thought Ben picked up everything,” said Dynan. “He just reads the game so well. Look at our third goal.
"He made a last-ditch tackle in front of our backline, picked it up, got it through and Louie eventually scored. But that all came from Ben reading the game. We haven’t had that this year in the middle of the park. We had two against three in the middle today and still dominated.”
Dempsey joins fellow Charlton loanee Alfie Doughty in red-and-white hoops this season, while Crystal Palace’s Tyler Brown and James Daly have also impressed.
Things did not start well at King George’s Field amid wet and windy conditions. In just the fourth minute, Bognor’s Dan Smith got in front of his marker to turn a Tommy Scutt cross past Rob Tolfrey.
But then Sean Clohessy found Daly on the right and the youngster cut inside before curling the ball around goalkeeper Dan Lincoln from the corner of the penalty box.
By the 18th minute Ks had turned the game completely on its head. A Lincoln clearance only reached Shaun McAuley 35 yards out and he carried the ball forward before powering home from 20 yards. Another fine goal saw Ks go 3-1 to the good, a Delano Sam-Yorke header and Elliott Buchanan backheel setting up Louie Theophanous who lashed his strike first-time low past the keeper.
Ks wrapped the game up with a fine second-half free-kick from Buchanan, curled with pace into the top corner.
New centre-back Dean Inman was pleased to experience his first K’s win and see the team rise to 4th in the table. “It wasn’t the best start!” he said. “We lost 4-0 at home on my debut and then drew last weekend when we should’ve won but didn’t take our chances.
"Today we certainly did. [The conditions] must be fun for the fans when you can watch the players sliding around like nutters. But that second-half, that was tough. It was boggy. It’s alright until you can’t keep your feet!”
“I liked today because we went 1-0 behind and we showed character to come straight back” added Dynan. “We had so many chances, it could’ve been six, seven or eight. When we keep our backline high, we can cause teams problems. Any formation, if you sit in and start dropping, you’re inviting pressure.
"That undoes us sometimes. But we’re starting to work out how not to do that, even in spells in games when we don’t have possession.”
Kingstonian face landlords Corinthian-Casuals at King George’s Field on Saturday.
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