WHEN Tom Smith returned to the home changing room having made his landmark first-ever professional start for Colchester United, he was met with a rousing round of applause from his team-mates.

“After the game, everyone was really complimentary of me," said Smith, who enjoyed the perfect debut after helping the U's to a 4-0 win and a clean sheet, against Crewe Alexandra.

“That felt very special so I’m very grateful to do it with these boys – they’re unbelievable.

“Since being a boy going into Academy football at six or seven years old, it’s the one thing you dream of, making your debut on the professional stage.

“I was over the moon to do that.

“My Dad was in the crowd, which was great for him to see."

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Smith was well and truly thrown in at the deep end, for his milestone EFL bow.

The Arsenal loanee had been set to be on the bench but a back injury to Kieran O'Hara in the warm-up led to him being thrust into the U's starting line-up at short notice, for their important League Two clash.

“We sort of had a bit of an inkling that something might happen, because Kieran had a bit of a sore back," said Smith.

Ben Garner fully focused on Salford game...and not looming Crawley visit

“He came out for the warm-up and did the first ten minutes but couldn’t do it and the gaffer had said to me just before that if anything’s wrong, there’s no stress, you go straight in.

“I really train hard for moments like that, just to step in.

“There was no time for me to think ‘oh my God, this is going to happen’.

“It’s just ‘right, you’ve got to do your job now’.

“Luckily, it was quite a nice game for me playing my first game.

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“The boys played really well and being 3-0 up at half-time was unbelievable.

“I didn’t touch the ball for the first 20 minutes and I was on the edge of my box going ‘someone just give it to me!’.

“But it was great and we’ve sort of needed that over the last few weeks.

“We’ve had a lot of draws and a lot of nearlys, so it was good to first score a lot of goals but also get over the line and keep another clean sheet, which the team were over the moon with."

Smith had a relatively quiet afternoon on his debut, following Colchester's dominant win.

Banter with Burns with CUSA chairman Jon Burns

However, the 21-year-old did have to retain his focus for the full game and dived low to his left to push away Daniel Agyei's low shot, with eight minutes to go.

Smith said: “You often hear that training is harder than a game for a goalkeeper because you might only get one or two things to do.

“But if you don’t do those things well, we win 4-1 and everyone says ‘great win’ but actually, that one-goal difference might be crucial, at the end of the season.

“Part of the job is mentally, to be really on it the whole game in case anything happens.

“You hope it doesn’t but you have to be ready."

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Smith has been competing with O'Hara for the Colchester goalkeeper jersey since joining them on loan from Premier League leaders Arsenal, in January.

The former Bromley loanee has revealed O'Hara supported him prior to him making his debut against Crewe.

Smith said: “It’s a constant cycle throughout the season and me and Kieran have a great relationship.

“I’d probably I talk to him most out of all the boys.

“We work together every day and when he did get injured, he came into the dressing room and was sitting with me, keeping me calm before the game.

“We have a really good relationship and we push each other in training and it works well for the team.

“As a goalkeeper, you always try and learn little bits from everyone else.

“Watching Kieran who is four or five years older than me, I can see certain things.

“With crosses and set plays for example, I see how him and the team work defensively and I can look at it and think that’s something that works really well and I want to introduce that to my game or keep that up, if I do have to step in.

“You train every day so when moments like this happen, there’s no stress and you walk straight in, fit the system and everyone knows their jobs."

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Smith says he has enjoyed playing under Ben Garner, since his arrival as head coach.

The young shot-stopper says they are targeting at least three clean sheets in their final five matches, ahead of their trip to play Salford City tomorrow.

“He’s brought in a new system in terms of we’re really tight defensively and if we can stay in the game and it gets to 78 minutes and it’s still 0-0, there’s always going to be chances," added Smith, who joined Arsenal's academy at the age of eight and signed his first professional contract with the club in December, 2019.

“I think the whole team has been a lot tighter defensively, especially recently.

The target Ben Garner has set his Colchester United side ahead of final five games

“We’ve had that little bit of drive to keep going, knowing that we’ve got the quality of player in the forward line to score goals.

“I’ve really enjoyed working with the new manager and everyone.

“The gaffer has said that if we can get clean sheets, we’ll always get a chance to score.

“You’re building the foundation of the performance – we’ve got five games left and our target is to have a minimum of three clean sheets.

“That guarantees you at least one point a game.

“That’s definitely building blocks to start from and it’s crucial.

“Coming off a 4-0 win, we’re a team with confidence.

“We want to really push and get another few wins."