Great Escape complete for St Albans City after Dartford win
St Albans skipper Sam Corcoran has been named player of the month for April. Picture: BOB WALKLEY - Credit: Archant
St Albans City will be playing in the Vanarama National League South again next year after a 4-0 win over Dartford at a packed Clarence Park.
The Saints seemed dead and buried in February and it is a sign of how far they were behind that their unbelievable change in fortunes had still not brought them safety going into this final game.
The opening two goals were scrappy but nobody in Clarence Park cared.
First Lee Chappell did brilliantly to create space and get a cross in and Kaloczi got something on it to deflect it beyond the keeper.
The second was a Chappell long throw which seemed to miss everyone but in his attempts to clear it Becka-Kah Demebele slammed it into the roof of the net.
Louie Theophanous curled one in form out wide before Kaloczi grabbed his second six minutes from time heading in another Chappell cross.
The party had well and truly started by then though.
Most Read
- 1 Revealed: Hertfordshire's most desirable villages
- 2 10 filming locations of new Netflix series Stay Close
- 3 Ricky Gervais' Netflix series After Life filmed in Hertfordshire
- 4 Party leaders at odds over latest delay to St Albans Local Plan
- 5 Revealed: The five areas of Hertfordshire where the average home costs more than £1m
- 6 Town bank building given green light to split into three
- 7 St Albans hockey player still going strong at 80
- 8 Careers advice for St Albans children in centuries gone by
- 9 The Hairy Bikers set to ride into St Albans for this year's Pub in the Park festival
- 10 Caretakers of creation: church's work protecting environment
It hadn’t been as relaxed early on with City understandably displaying nerves.
Kaloczi’s first settled them and City looked like the team who would get the next.
Charlie MacDonald, Harry Anderson and Theophanous were both denied by some fantastic defending by Dartford, who blocked everything.
MacDonald did get sight of goal after the ball squirted to him from a 50-50 challenge between Eddie Oshodi and Dartford keeper Dean Gardikiotis.
However to the surprise of most of the big Clarence Park crowd, the veteran striker elected to pass across goal and the ball was cleared.
It mirrored the Darts best opportunity when a two-on-one break gave Danny Harris a chance to shoot.
But again he chose to pass and Ben Martin cleared.
The management side didn’t look over impressed with some of City’s play in the first half as the ball seemed to be played long too often.
Their mood changed considerably six minutes into the second half with Dembele’s error.
From then on City were dominant.
MacDonald had one ruled out for offside and Sam Corcoran clipped the top of the bar.
The rest of the game was spent with City fans going through their repertoie of songs.
“We’ll win the league next year,” they sung.
On this form they just might.
City: Welch, Thomas, Bender, Kaloczi, Oshodi, Martin, Anderson (Gibson 83), Corcoran, Theophanous, MacDonald, Chappell
Subs (not used): Locke, Gibson, Bangura, Green, Thalassitis
Goals: Kaloczi 17, Dembele (og) 51
Dartford: Gardikiotis, Gardiner, Wynter (Dembele 46), Vint, Wood, Burns, Hayes (Francis 59), E.Bradbrook, T.Bradbrook, Pugh, Harris
Subs (not used): Cogan, Ferguson, Simmons
Goals:
Attendance: 1,310
