Aveley 1, St Albans City 1

MILLERS were left to rue missed opportunities after drawing at home to St Albans City, who equalised late on with their first shot on target.

The visitors controlled a lot of possession in the first half but didn't do an awful lot with it. Crosses into the Aveley box were well defended by the Aveley backline.

The hosts were the ones with more of the chances; Suley Zuhdu saw an acrobatic effort curl wide of the left-hand post. George Saunders forced the Saints keeper into a smart save as he flew low down to keep out a whipped effort from the Aveley winger.

Just before half-time, George Saunders tried his luck again; this time the keeper was beaten, but the effort whistled past the right-hand post.

Aveley came out firing in the second half, and a mixture of the St Albans goalkeeper, Michael Bostwick chucking himself at everything, and a touch of good fortune kept them out.

Bostwick denied two goalbound shots from Zuhdu and Ollie Peters. A touch of good fortune then appeared for St Albans; a George Saunders effort took a deflection which looked destined for the bottom corner of the goal, instead went an inch wide of the right-hand post.

With just over 20 minutes to go, Aveley finally got their deserved breakthrough. Zuhdu powered past Fyfield and rifled home a brilliant finish past Norman into the roof of the net.

Aveley had the chance to double the lead soon after; Tobi Tinubu went through on goal and chose to pass it square to Zuhdu to tap home, but the pass was misplaced and the chance was lost.

Zuhdu and Tinubu both had chances of their own; the former was his effort squeezed behind for a corner, and the latter saw his driven effort go wide of the right-hand post.

The visitors then produced a sucker punch; a corner dropped fortuitously to substitute Sippetts, who fired home from ten yards out to pull St Albans level. They almost won it late on; Sery found Sam Smart, who beat the keeper, but a great goal-line clearance from Jayden Gipson denied the visitors the ultimate smash and grab.

Millers are next in action at the weekend in the FA Cup. They will hope to build on the first qualifying round triumph against Hashtag United, after being paired away to paired with AFC Sudbury who play in the Southern Premier League Premier Central Division.

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