Goals from Junior Morias and Louie Theophanous twice gave St Albans City the lead but Wealdstone fought back both times to claim a 2-2 draw at Grosvenor Vale.

In the end it was probably a fair result but City will be disappointed they couldn’t hang on to all three points in their second Vanarama National League South game.

The first half belonged to Wealdstone but it was City who opened the scoring on 12 minutes with a shambolic goal from the home point-of-view.

Josh McLeod-Urquhart’s backpass was woefully short of Jonathan North and while he waited for it to roll into the box, Dipo Akinyemi nipped in to pinch it off him.

From there it was just a matter of a short pass to Morias for the tap-in.

It was against the run of play but Wealdstone were deservedly level two minutes later.

Elliot Benyon was found unmarked at the back post and he fired across James Russell for the equaliser.

City had started very slowly and incredibly nervously in defence and they were indebted to Russell in the opening 10 minutes.

The keeper was required to deal with a number of corners and made a superb fingertip stop to tip a Benyon effort onto the bar and over.

Wealdstone’s new signing from Hayes & Yeading was a constant thorn to the City defence and could have finished the first half with a hat-trick.

St Albans only showed flashes of promise with Akinyemi testing North late on and Louie Theophanous unable to connect in front of goal.

The second half saw City in a much more positive mood and they were back in front after five minutes.

A long throw found Theophanous and the City hotshot turned brilliantly to fire low into the corner.

He almost repeated the feat shortly after but this time his shot was straight at North who hung on to the ball.

And it was from the hosts’ first real attacking threat of the half that they levelled for the second time.

Wellard picked the ball up on the left corner of the box and drilled it low to the corner.

City though still carved out the better chances.

Akinyemi was guilty of over complicating things when he really needed to test the keeper, Thomas fired wide and Morias teed up Theophanous whose shot was blocked.

Wealdstone were still dangerous on the break with former City man Eddie Oshodi launching a number of rampaging runs down the right.

Injury time saw action at both ends.

City had a late shout for a penalty as Rhys Hoenes went down but that was waved away with the Saints winger being booked for diving.

Wealdstone then had a shot flash inches over the bar as time ran out.

City: Russell, Herd, Bender, Chappell, Martin, Johnson, Lucien (Hoenes 72), Thomas, Theophanous, Morias, Akinyemi (Merson 82)

Subs (not used): Ball, Hill, Rees

Goals: Morias 12, Theophanous 50

Wealdstone: North, Oshodi, McLeod-Urquhart, Parker (Hamblin 57), Cadmore, Hunt (Godfrey 36), Whichelow (Kabba 77), Green, Benyon, Wellard, Williams

Subs (not used): Hutchinson, Brown

Goals: Benyon 14, Wellard 65

Attendance: 824

Referee: Mr Ian Fissenden