St Albans City made their long-awaited return to action with a glut of goals.

New signings Shaun Jeffers and Mitchell Weiss both scored twice while there was also a debut strike for Joseph Chidyausiku in the 5-2 win over Essex Senior League Hashtag United at Clarence Park.

It was a comfortable victory but it took City around 10 minutes to truly get into the flow of the game.

In this time Hashtag took an early lead with Toby Aromolaran hitting home a beautiful left-footed volley from a corner.

It looked like the Saints were well and truly off the boil until the 17th minute when Solomon Nwabuokei played a cross-field through ball into the feet of Jeffers and he slotted it into the far corner of the net for his first of the afternoon.

Not long after they were in front after a free-kick into the box caused absolute havoc for the Hashtag backline, leading to a tap in for Jeffers.

From then on the Saints looked very much in control with Romeo Akinola playing in Weiss who, after his initial shot was saved, was eventually able to finish from close range.

City almost added another to their tally with Zane Banton seeing a strike from 25 yards crash off the post after taking a slight deflection on its way from a Hashtag defender.

Wholesale changes at the break saw a different St Albans side take the field for the second half and this seemed to slow the pace of the game.

And it wasn’t until just over 10 minutes from the end that a ball in from the left was controlled by Joseph Chidyausiku before he rolled it across the keeper into the bottom corner.

Number five followed soon after, a David Noble corner was initially headed towards goal by Tom Bender.

That was parried out into the path of Weiss who slotted home for his second of the afternoon.

The visitors then scored a late consolation with what was as good as the last kick of the game.

St Albans City: Johnson, Stanley, trialist, Wiltshire, trialist, Bender, Akinola, Nwabuokei, Jeffers, Onokwai, Banton.

Subs: De Groot, Diedhiou, trialist, Clark, Dada, Sundire, Chidyausiku, Weiss, Noble.

Hashtag United: Jackson, Newby, Tsingano, Berkake, Hewitt, Gill, Gleed, Waller-Lassen, Osude, Smith, Aromolaran.

Subs: Keith, Carter, Honesty, Brougham, Gregory, Martin.