Early Blue Square South pacesetters Lewes were denied a seventh victory in eight outings on Saturday thanks to the brilliance of St Albans City goalkeeper Nick Eyre who topped an outstanding personal performance with an injury time penalty save from the prolific Paul Booth that secured the Saints first home point of the season.
Eyre has proved himself to be a more than worthy successor to the charismatic Paul Bastock but the string of outstanding saves he produced against Steve King’s highly rated Rooks only marginally overshadowed City’s best display of the season. St Albans took the honours with regards to possession but when Lewes moved forward the threat on goal was far greater than that of the hosts, even so to hand the Saints a fourth successive defeat on home soil would have been a tad unjust.
Lewes, with former Saint Tom Davis in relatively subdued mood in midfield, started the game positively attacking the York Road goal but quickly learnt that the Saints have unearthed another top quality keeper. On nine minutes Davis’s quickly free kick freed Andy Drury only to Eyre to rescue a sleepy defence and three minutes later Booth had the ball whipped off his toes by the sprawling keeper.
Midway through the half Mark Beard was fortunate to stay on the pitch when catching Jamie Cade with a late challenge just seconds after being cautioned following a dreadful volley of abuse at a linesman. On 26 minutes City mustered their first on target effort of the afternoon but Danny Morgan’s shot failed to trouble the towering Steven Williams.
Gradually, City imposed themselves on the game with several fine passing moves and by the interval Ritchie Hanlon’s side could have edged ahead. Hector Mackie, who three times switched flanks with Hassan Sulaiman, had a low shot well taken by the keeper while Morgan, after good approach work from Lee Clarke and Scott Cousins, ought to have opened the scoring only for his rising effort to flicked over by Williams.
There was an edge to the play all afternoon and the leniency referee John Magill displayed in allowing the previously booked Clarke to stay on the pitch after an astonishing hack on Jay Conroy did little to quell the simmering tension.
Morgan, after a neat flick and good work by Clarke and the excellent Paul Smith, flashed a shot across the visitors goal before Conroy ended a powerful run with a low shot that Eyre held cleanly. What appeared to be Eyre’s highpoint of the day came on 69 minutes when Matt Groves cut the ball back to Drury whose cross found the unmarked Cade only for his point blank header to ricochet to safety off the body of the magnificent City keeper.
Possibly looking to correct his decision not to dismiss Clarke, referee Magill ignored a blatant foul in the penalty area on the City captain by Ian Simpemba, even before the protests had died down Eyre was producing more heroics as Booth again broke clear.
Back came City as Clarke spread the ball wide to Morgan who, after darting to the goalline, clipped a cross to the back post where Clarke was denied his first goal of the season by the diving Williams. But on 78 minutes St Albans went ahead with an excellent goal as Drury wasted a surging run with a poor ball that Cousins intercepted and played upfield to Clarke who quite superbly sent Morgan clear of a square defence. As Williams advanced Morgan carefully slipped his third goal of the season to the keepers left. It was the first goal conceded by Lewes in exactly 500 minutes.
But within three minutes scoring the opening goal in a match for the first time this season City’s lead was wiped out. After a corner from the Rooks right was partially cleared Drury drilled a misdirected shot across the goal but well wide until Booth cheekily back-heeled the ball beyond the startled Eyre.
Lewes now closed in for the kill but three times in quick succession Groves was thwarted by Eyre. Even so, City’s best performance thus far looked set to go unrewarded when, almost four minutes into added time, Mr Magill decided that Clarke had impeded Drury after the City striker had appeared to clip Conroy’s long ball into the chest of the Rooks winger. Booth stepped up looking to notch his tenth goal of the season and sixth from the penalty spot, Eyre had other such thoughts and diving full length to his right parried Booth’s low spot kick and grabbed the loose ball before anyone could ruin his day.
Report courtesy of The St Albans & Harpenden Review |
