Tonbridge Angels 2 St Albans City 1

Match 46/19/1768 - Saturday, 16th November 2019 - National South

Tonbridge Angels (1) 2 Greenhalgh 29 Da Costa 77
St Albans City (0) 1 Banton 90
Attendance: 592

Admission: Pass
Programme: £2.50
Mileage: 38/3,541

It will be several months, through the bleak, dark days of winter, before we know whether the turning point of this season, as with the Brightlingsea game of almost a year ago, was that last minute equaliser against Oxford City a fortnight ago. The comparisons are very stark, a late equaliser (although not quite as late as Oxford) and a new signing lifting the spirits.

At the start of this month, a make or break in lots of people’s eyes, nine points out of the 12 on offer was the dream scenario. As it stands, because of the postponement at Hungerford, four from six is the total and I think those people might accept that.

Ben Greenhalgh has arrived, on loan from Dartford, and made an instant impression with a superb free kick after 29 minutes against similarly relegation-threatened St Albans City. Also boosting the hopes of supporters was the performance in midfield of another recent signing, Christ Tiehi, who was simply magnificent.

Early nervousness gave way to optimism as Tonbridge started brightly with Greenhalgh shooting wide and St Albans goalkeeper, Dave Snedker saving from D’Sean Theobalds after parrying a Khale Da Costa cross.

The optimism rose further, after 29 minutes, when Greenhalgh curled a free kick from the edge of the box into the right hand corner of the net to give the Angels a deserved lead.

St Albans barely registered a shot on target in the first half whilst further chances fell the way of Theobalds and Jared Small.

After an early effort from Da Costa into the side netting, St Albans had their first, and only period in the game when they looked threatening. Guiseppe Iaciafano shot over and Olayemi Oyinsan headed over.

After 71 minutes, Jason Williams replaced Tom Derry and the move quickly brought a dividend when he linked well with Da Costa, setting up the winger to steer a shot into the far corner from the left side of the box.

But nothing comes easy at Longmead and after substitute Joe Turner had wasted a great chance, firing at Snedker, Zane Banton drove a shot into the roof of the net to set up an unnecessarily nervous finish. When St Albans won a free kick on the edge of the box, three minutes into added time, all sorts of nightmares were rekindled but Scott Shulton’s effort did no more than hit the wall and everyone breathed once more.