THE WHITE Tigers battled back from two goals down to draw 2-2 at Hampton & Richmond Borough.
There was a cagey opening to this Bank Holiday Monday encounter with our first sight of goal coming on six minutes when Dan Rooney fired over.
We were seeing plenty of the ball in our hosts’ half early on and Connor Riley-Lowe did well out wide before delivering an inviting cross which evaded everyone.
Our next raid saw Harry Warwick do well as be broke into the area only to fire into the side-netting.
Despite our endeavours, we fell behind just before the half-hour mark when Zak Joseph found the net.
We continued to look to get the ball down and play and there was a neat move involving Dan Rooney, Tyler Harvey and Jared Lewington which saw the latter get a strike in on goal but it failed to trouble the ‘keeper.
Then Harvey battled well to make room for a strike which was well saved before he was off target in the next attack as we continued to look the more likely side.
There was a good chance right on the stroke of half-time when a corner from Riley-Lowe caused our hosts problems and Jamie Richards headed just over.
We played well in the opening period but made the worst possible start to the second half as we conceded a penalty within the opening couple of minutes from which our opponents were able to double their advantage.
Going two down deflated us for a time and the home side almost added another as they rattled the woodwork before Nick Grimes did well to thwart another break into the area.
Gradually we started to get back into the game and after forcing a series of corners, we were able to reduce the arrears when Harvey turned the ball home from close range.
As our belief came back we were just lacking that final ball to make things happen. By pushing up in search of the equaliser, it did leave us exposed at the back on occasions as Alexis Jr saved well with eight minutes to go to keep us in it.
As the clock ticked down, Jason Banton missed a great opportunity before the leveller finally arrived in the final minute when Jamie Richards came in at the far post to guide the ball home beyond the despairing dive of the home ‘keeper to make it 2-2.
It takes our battle to avoid the drop to the final game of the season but the players certainly showed plenty of battling qualities on this occasion.

WHITE TIGERS: Alexis Jr, Thompson, Riley-Lowe, Grimes, J.Richards, Booth, Allen (Regis 40), D. Rooney (Banton 73), Warwick (Copp 52), Harvey, Lewington. Subs not used: Palfrey, Diau.
GOAL(S): Harvey, J. Richards
ATTENDANCE: 509.

PHOTO: Josh Miller.