Wealdstone1

Bishop's Stortford1

AFTER recently demolishing Wealdstone 7-1 in the league, perhaps the Blues though, this would be a similarly one-sided contest, but how wrong they were. Either Wealdstone brought them down to their level, or the Blues just did not perform.

Whatever reason they choose, Stortford should be grateful to have a second attempt at securing a home tie with Grays Athletic in the next round.

Wealdstone started the brightest of the two sides and took the lead as early as the sixth minute when sloppy defending by Stortford let in Danny Tilbury who gave the Stones faithful an early cheer by rifling home.

Stortford continued to have a lot of possession but whenever Wealdstone got the ball, their lively forward Marvin Morgan was a handful.

Unfortunately for the Stones, Morgan had to be substituted after picking up an injury with ten minutes to go before half-time.

Stortford got desperate and with the minutes ticking away they took the gamble of replacing Joel Marie-Sainte with Mark Risley, who went straight up front to form a three pronged attack along with Hayes and Paul.

It was Risley's presence that led to the Blues' equaliser with just four minutes remaining. A corner was flung into the box and with Risley making a nuisance of himself the ball hit Jason Shaw's knee and crept over the line.

There was still time for Wealdstone to create problems at the other end with the ball flying dangerously around the Stortford penalty box, but in the end a 1-1 draw was a fair result and the Blues will look to complete the job in the replay on Tuesday evening (yesterday).

f=Zapf Dingbats loThe Blues recently crashed out of the East Anglian Cup at United Counties League outfit Stotfold. Stortford fielded mainly a reserve team and the hosts took the lead after 35 minutes when Mike Collier did not hold a long range shot and a Stotfold foot poked the ball home.

The Blues equalised on the stroke of half time when Trevor Paul fired home, but in the 90th minute the Bedfordshire outfit grabbed the winner.

Stortford entertain struggling Whyteleafe in the league on Saturday hoping to maintain their excellent recent league form.

This game will start at 3pm, despite the England versus Sweden friendly.