Colney Heath held sixth-placed Arlesey Town to a 1-1 draw in the Spartan South Midlands Premier Division.

With goalkeepers Charlie May and Tom Blackman unavailable, Enzo Sgambati, a recent signing from Markyate, made his debut between the sticks while three players from the U18’s, Kai Peters, Lejhai Henriques and Dominic Knaggs made the substitutes bench.

The Magpies found themselves a goal down after only four minutes when both Josh Humbert and Dan Westmore failed to clear Alex O’Brien’s cross, and the ball broke for Ryan Lamond to fire past Sgambati to give Arlesey an early lead.

However, the hosts didn’t have to wait long for an equaliser as Harry Lewis and Dan Fitzgerald combined down the right wing for the latter to cross, and after George Devine’s header crashed off the bar, he was quickest to react once more and fired into the roof of the net to level the scores.

Devine came close to putting Heath ahead soon after when he was found by Spencer Clarke-Mardel, but his shot was blocked by Ross Taylor.

The home side continued to pressurise the visitors after the break, with Westmore and Lewis making surging runs down each wing, with Frankie Jowle coming close to scoring from Lewis’ ball in, but he fired over the bar.

Both sides were creating good opportunities in the second period the visitors had two excellent opportunities to win it late on – firstly, O’Brien’s free-kick struck the inside of the post and trickled along the line before being cleared, and then Aarron Browne struck the crossbar with a brilliant effort before the ball was cleared by Dan McCafferty.

The Magpies survived the late scares, though, and picked up a good point ahead of this weekend’s derby game away at London Colney on Saturday, February 16.