St Albans City 1 Aylesbury United 2

TRYING to read too much into pre-season summer friendly matches is a fruitless exercise but Saturday's reversal for St Albans City at home to an Aylesbury United side, relegated last season from the Ryman League Premier Division, was a confidence deflating experience for the small gathering of local supporters sprinkled around the Clarence Park terraces.

Coming less than 24 hours after a relatively strong side was knocked out of the Herts Charity Cup by a Stevenage Borough Reserve side, an inept display against Gary Phillips' Aylesbury side was not what City needed and the running around the pitch by the City players shortly after the final whistle, suggests that manager Kevin Mudd was also none too pleased with what he saw.

Having defeated Woking in some comfort just seven days earlier, Saturday's defeat is all the more baffling and there are clearly some disciplinary points requiring urgent attention. For the second week running Phil Gridelet received a stern warning from the referee, quite a rarity in a friendly match, whilst Martin Randall wasted no time in showing that he lost none of the petulance which blighted so many of his performances last season. Perhaps had referee Carl Couzens flashed a red card in Randall's direction during the final minute, rather than a yellow one, then maybe the message may have got through that his antics are not acceptable.

As for the game, the opening 40 minutes were most notable for the total absence of goalmouth activity. Both defences looked resolute and neither attack was allowed time to build on what few moves of promise were crafted by either midfield. However, all that changed during the final five minutes of the half when Aylsebury caused City all manner of problems.

On 41 minutes City keeper, Lawrence Batty, palmed over a Peter Clifford header but two minutes later the former England semi-professional international goalkeeper flapped weakly at a cross and was thankful to see Al-James Hannigan clear Darren Grieves' clever overhead effort from the line. City were now wilting in the hot summer sun and on 43 minutes the Ducks went ahead with Danny Honeyball neatly firing into the back of the York Road goal after evading a couple of challenges.

Just 30 seconds into the second half, a slip by Corey Campbell let in Jefferson Louis who carefully slotted the Ducks into a two goal lead. One minute later, Chris Piper hit back with City's first on-target effort of the match which James Courtnage tipped over and soon after, the former Hampton custodian was called into action to deal with Spencer Knight's well placed free-kick. City kept up the pressure with Chris Sparks heading just wide from a Knight corner and Randall fired wide after a good exchange of passes with Gary Walker.

City reduced the arrears on 66 minutes when Walker played a short pass to Mark Rooney who sent a delightful defence splitting pass along the ground to an offside-looking Randall who ran through and powerfully shot past Courtnage. As City sought an equaliser tempers became heated on both sides, with some wicked late challenges keeping Couzens busy and, following a terrible lunge by Tony Millard on Randall, he ordered Aylesbury to make a substitution. Sadly that move failed to calm matters and both Gridelet and Randall received rebukes from the overworked match official.

St Albans City: Batty, Rooney, Risley, Campbell (Sparks 54), Hannigan, Gridelet, Pratt (Evans 74), Piper, Samuels (Randall 54), Ansell (Walker 54), Knight.

Booked: Randall.