BOSS John Eustace hailed the impact of Harriers’ new signing James Pearson who scored a brace of headers to help his side take the spoils in a nine-goal thriller at Aggborough.

The defender, playing his home debut in the 5-4 win over form team Blyth Spartans, provided two vital goals to seal the comeback victory, with the other strikes coming from forwards Andre Brown, Emmanuel Sonupe and Andre Wright.

Eustace said: “I’m pleased for James. He came into the squad last week and he’s a big character and settled in straight away.

“Hopefully he can keep more clean sheets that score goals though.”

However, poor defending from both sides made it a nervy 90 minutes for Eustace, but the boss praised the character of his young team in being able to take the three points despite having to fight back from going behind twice in the game.

“It was a very exciting game for the neutral and both sets of fans,” he said. “Obviously not as exciting for the two managers but I’d delighted with the win and the character the boys showed.

“The young group did fantastically well to turn the game around, especially playing one of the top teams in the league at the moment.

“Blyth are a really good footballing team, I’ve seen them four or five times now and they have an excellent manager and all their players are good on the ball. They’re a good team so I was very delighted to get the win.

“I couldn’t be more pleased with how we went forwards. They’re all young players and they’re going to learn from experiences like this, especially at the end, they managed to get forward and manage the game lot better.

“I don’t think anyone saw that sort of game coming. There’s lots of positives to take out of it, but there’s also a lot of work we need to do on the training pitch to stop conceding goals.”

Kidderminster face a long trip to the north east next Saturday to play Newcastle Benfield as they aim to reach the fourth qualifying round of the FA Cup.

Eustace added: “It’s going to be a really tough game. They’re very good at home and it will be a tough cup tie, but hopefully we will go about our business very professionally and get a positive result.

“I’m sure if they watch highlights of this game they’ll be concerned about us going forwards but defensively, they won’t be that worried.”