St Albans City crashed out of the FA Trophy with a 3-1 defeat away to National League South rivals Welling United but manager Ian Allinson believed his side could and should have picked up the victory.

Saints had grabbed a 1-0 lead at half-time thanks to a Zane Banton goal in what was a far better performance than of late.

And they were looking good until two goals in two minutes just past the hour mark completed flipped the tables.

That led to them losing their way and even though Danny Waldren was sent off for the hosts with nine minutes to go, a third Welling goal five minutes later killed the game off.

Allinson said: "The two goals hasn't helped our confidence but for long periods I felt we bossed the game and when I say that I mean we were totally in charge.

"If you look at them they had six chances in the whole game and scored three.

"We had about 10 chances but have scored one. And that's the story at times of our season.

"When we have our good spells we're not putting teams to bed and they're all the things we've got to try and work on.

"It just feels like I'm saying the same old [things] but every game so far I can say we've had really good spells and should be scoring goals and winning games of football.

"It was pleasing on the eye in the first half and we should have punished them more.

"We spoke at half-time about doing the simple things but we over-complicated it in the second half."

Banton's goal on 20 minutes came after good work from Sam Merson, playing what Allinson said was his "best performance in 10 months".

And the City boss wants more of the same from the rest of his squad as they now concentrate fully on improving their perilous league position.

He said: "Winning is a habit and it breeds winning but losing is a habit too.

"We have to tread carefully with the players but at some stage they have to take responsibility for their performance.

"There were loads of positives and I'm loathed to say how we can improve but we do have to improve.

"I've had challenges in my career and I'm not one to shy away from them.

"We mustn't panic. We need to teach the players the correct habits and we need to cut out and nullify the mistakes we make."