St Albans City boss McCann praises ‘heroic performances’ as his team pass tough test

St Albans City 3 Burgess Hill 1 (Isthmian League Premier Division)
From Jess Unwin at Clarence Park

Sam Donkin’s remarkable double save from a 66th-minute penalty was the pivotal moment in a hard-won victory that Gary McCann described as one the best performances during his time as Saints manager.

With City centre back Darion Furlong sent off in the incident that led to the spot-kick, Burgess Hill looked poised to level the scores at 2-2 and take command of this exhilarating contest.

Instead, Donkin’s brilliance between the sticks helped shape a completely different outcome – one that saw Saints first fend off the continuing challenge of the visitors and then eventually increase their lead to 3-1 and clinch all three points.

Tuesday night’s showing was a marked, and perhaps significant, contrast to the corresponding fixture last season. In that game, McCann criticised his team for lacking intensity and focus after they lost 4-3 to the Hillians.

Eleven months on from that, his message on the club’s YouTube channel, was very different: “We were odds on to be beat when that penalty was awarded and the red card given, but this team seem to be made of sterner stuff and I couldn’t be prouder.”

The performance was “one of the best” in his tenure as boss, he said, and he praised his players’ resilience and togetherness. “There was so much good in the latter stages that you need for a team to be successful.”

He added: “I don’t want to single players out because there were so many heroic performances tonight and to get the win and the three points it feels like a really important result.”

St Albans went ahead after just five mins when Mikey Faulkner’s typically positive and penetrating run into the visitors’ penalty box caused panic and the ball looped over Burgess keeper Roco Rees and into the net. Striker Kai Brown was credited with the final touch, and that now makes him City’s top scorer with 10 goals in all competitions.

There were chances for both teams in an end-to end first half before the men in yellow and blue went 2-0 up on 44 minutes with a contender for goal of the month. Faulkner again probed Burgess territory with a pass to Brown, whose lay-off for Zak Sowden-Fletcher set up the teenage left back to lash the ball home.

After the break, the team from West Sussex, who pushed City all the way in this game, were much the better side and deservedly pulled a goal back on 63 minutes when the low cross from the diminutive but impressive George Vorster forced an own goal from Remi Sutton.

The momentum was now firmly with Burgess Hill and even after Donkin’s penalty saves, 10-men St Albans had their work cut out to hold on to their lead.

Substitute Inih Effiong and winger Ollie Knight, having his best game in a City shirt, began to help the home side get back into it. And after 78 minutes, Knight cleverly won a corner that Sowden-Fletcher poked home for his second goal and City’s third.

Donkin was called upon to make two further saves, one from a ferocious close-range volley that looked certain to burst the net, but St Albans held on – to the delight of the majority of the 570 crowd.

A glut of cup games means St Albans haven’t been in league action recently, so Tuesday’s victory only moves them into 10th spot in the Premier Division, 11 points behind first-placed Enfield, but with three games in hand.

Following their last-gasp exit from the FA Cup earlier this month, Saints bowed out of the FA Trophy in a similar dramatic fashion on Saturday, losing a penalty shoot-out to Whitehawk.

In the driving wind and rain of Storm Boelo – conditions St Albans City manager Gary McCann described as “horrible” – his team fell behind, battled back to take the lead, fell behind again and then got a late leveller to make it 3-3 at the end of normal time.

Players from both sides then missed their spot kicks in the shoot-out before, at the sudden death stage, Sam Ayolie’s effort against the bar proved decisive as Nikolai Krokhin then stepped up to make the final penalties tally 5-4 to Whitehawk.

McCann said the weather had made the game “a lottery” and that the wind had “played havoc” with City’s attempts to build from the back. However, he added: “The conditions were the same for both teams so it’s no excuse.”

Whitehawk were 1-0 up at half-time, thanks to Liam Moore’s thunderous right-foot drive from 25 yards out, but there was a dramatic turnaround after the break with Kai Brown scoring twice in quick succession for Saints.

First, on 61 minutes, Mikey Faulkner’s incisive pass put Brown through into the penalty box and as the Whitehawk keeper Hugo Fisher came out to clear the ball ricocheted off Brown and into an empty net.

Then, two minutes later, Brown met Ollie Knight’s cross from the left with a superb right-footed volley to make it 2-1 to City.

The home side weren’t done yet and replied with their own brace of goals. Kamarni Ryan made it 2-2 on 74 minutes before Rhys Murphy beat the Saints’ offside trap and put the Brighton outfit ahead after 82 minutes.

With time running out, Brown won a penalty after going down between two Whitehawk defenders in the box. Substitute Zane Banton’s spot kick, converted on the rebound after his first effort was saved, looked to have rescued the tie for Saints – but then came the shoot-out disappointment.

• It will feel a little like Groundhog Day for Saints this coming Saturday (31) as their next game is a league fixture away to…Whitehawk! City will hope to avenge their FA Trophy defeat against the team who currently occupy bottom spot in the Premier Division. Kick-off is 3pm. St Albans have a third game in less than a week next Monday (November 2) against Aveley, who finished second in season 2025-26 but are struggling at the wrong end of the table in this campaign.