Reggie Lambe made a dream start to his stint with new club Carlisle United at the weekend.

The Bermuda international scored on his debut donning the Carlisle badge to help his team to a share of the spoils in a 1-1 draw away to Portsmouth in their opening fixture of the 2016-17 Sky Bet League Two campaign on Saturday.

Lambe, who turned down a new deal at Mansfield Town after serving out his contract at the end of the previous campaign, took just fourteen minutes to open his account after slicing the back line open with his first touch and scoring with his second to stun a sell-out crowd of 17,570 at Fratton Park.

Portsmouth started the brighter of the two teams, with Milan Lalkovic forcing Mark Gillespie, the Carlisle goalkeeper, into a good save with little more than five minutes played.

Things changed soon after, however, when Lambe latched on to a neat through-ball from Mike Jones, and calmly slotted it past David Forde, the Portsmouth goalkeeper.

“It’s always good to score on your debut,” Lambe said. “We needed a goal early and got it. We knew we had to catch them on the break, and that’s what we did and we got the goal from it.

“I was thinking about going over him [Forde] but then he jumped up and so I sort of toe poked it underneath him and it went between his legs.”

Lambe’s neat finish gave the visitors the lead before their fortunes took a turn for the worst when Jamie Devitt, the midfielder, was sent off after being booked twice inside ten minutes.

Portsmouth capitalised on the numerical advantage before the break when Carl Baker, the former Milton Keynes Dons midfielder, equalised to rescue a point for the hosts on his debut.

“Unfortunately we couldn’t get all three points,” said Lambe, one of five new signings making their debuts for Carlisle, who was substituted in the 58th minute.

Ten-men Carlisle were fortunate to come away with a point as Michael Smith missed an open goal early in the second half for the home side.

Elsewhere, Chesterfield’s Bermudian striker Rai Simons came on as a 67th minute substitute in his team’s 1-1 draw away to Oxford United in their opening game of the League One season.

Wes Thomas gave the hosts the lead in the 31st minute before Ched Evans rescued a point for Chesterfield with a goal in the 76th minute.

Meanwhile, Nahki Wells watched his Huddersfield Town team-mates that start their Championship campaign with an impressive 2-1 win at home to Brentford on Saturday.

Elias Kachunga, the German Under-21 international on loan from Bundesliga side Ingolstadt, headed Huddersfield into the lead in the 50th minute.

Brentford equalised 27 minutes later through Nico Yennaris, but their joy was short-lived as Huddersfield regained the lead for good two minutes later when another debutant Kasey Palmer converted with his second touch.