We played a really good game against the Champions, as they had the benefit of being a year older through much of their chosen squad.
We matched them in all areas of the pitch, with some very positive and competitive displays from all the lads in our last outing.
A 18th minute opener from influential skipper Mitchell Wiseman from close range, following Callum Madigan's fine set-piece gave us the lead.
The Saints pulled level pretty quickly though, when Zaki Oualah couldn't hold onto Ken Ogbuagu's shot and Lawrence WROE was on hand to tuck away the rebound after 25 minutes.
Into the second-half we still kept playing "cat and mouse" with the Saints making every attempt to keep knocking them out of their stride.
Both Steve Kennedy and his couterpart on the opposing bench made changes offensively in a bid to see who would come out on top of this very tight affair.
It so very nearly paid off for us on 77 minutes, as substitute Ryan Egan delivered a inch perfect cross for our lightning left-back Louis Raphael to come homing in on it and connect with a fantastic header which hit the face of the crossbar and came back out with Warren Bell beaten all ends up by it in the Saints goal!
However, 30 seconds later it showed how football can change in an instant.
The Saints counter-attacked well and the ball was swept out to the left-wing for sub Gio LEE-BAPTISTE to send an unstoppable shot past Oualah into the top right-hand corner of the net.
We kept giving it our all at the end, in a game which on another day would have ended up as a draw being a fair result!
Att:56.
MoM:"FREDDIE" Mohamed.
Team:Oualah, Edwards, Raphael, Madigan, Wambeek, Wiseman(c), Igbinyemi, Murphy, El-Azizi, Mohamed, Dobbs.
Subs:Ross, Egan, Barrett, El-Amrani, Tamou.