The visitors started well and forced Heath goalkeeper Alfie Hadfield into an early save when James Jeffrey received the ball on the left of the penalty area and struck a low left foot shot that was blocked by Hadfield and spun out for a corner.

Next for the visitors was Rodney Erutor who received the ball wide on the right and the Oaks striker ran with the ball towards the Heath penalty area where he hit a left foot effort from 20 yards straight at Hadfield who gathered comfortably.

Heath gradually got into the game with Lewis Croal striking a right foot shot from 18 yards wide of the post and Mason Doughty forcing the first save from the Oaks keeper Jordan Perrin on 14minutes.

The opening goal came midway through the half when Erutor ran at the Heath back four before splitting the Heath defence with an inch perfect pass that allowed Warren-Hughes Mfula to run through and drill a low shot past Hadfield into the net.

The visitors continued to create the better chances with Erutor again coming inside to strike a left foot shot that flew high and wide of target and minutes later a cross from the left should have been headed home by the Oaks striker but he got his timing all wrong and the ball sailed over the crossbar and the fence behind the goal.

In the closing stages of the half and against the run of play, Heath equalised when Jamie Buchanan linked up with Sean Terry who played a pass between two defenders allowing Matt Hay to cut in from the left and the Heath midfielder smashed a left foot shot that flew high into the net at the near-post to make it 1-1 at the break.

Heath started the second half on the ascendency but without causing the visitors too many problems until the hour mark when a flowing five-man move down the left flank ended with the ball being crossed to Doughty on the right with time and space and he picked out Matt Hay close to the penalty spot who turned and swung a right foot shot that kept low and went under the diving keepers body into the bottom left corner, 2-1 to the Bears.

Minutes later Croal tried his luck with a right foot shot from distance that had Perrin scampering across his goal-line but to no avail as the ball flew narrowly wide of the post. And Jamie Chesworth tried his luck with a long range free-kick which flew just wide of the post.

In the closing stages the visitors threw everything forward in search of the equaliser, never mind the kitchen sink, I think they also threw in the bath and basin too but despite crashing one effort against the bar, surviving several goalmouth scrambles and seeing some brilliant goalkeeping by Hadfield it looked like the Bears would hold on to victory but in one last desperate Oaks attack in the 96th minute and with a packed goalmouth, the ball was hit low across the goal from the right to Mfula who diverted it into the net from six yards to bring his team level.

With only sufficient time to kick-off again before the referee brought an end to the proceedings it felt like a defeat for The Bears but on reflection and on the balance of play, probably a fair result.

Team: Hadfield, Terry, Chesworth, Buchanan (Cranmer-Flynn 90), Peters, Marino, Dowdell (Sim90), Parmiter, Croal (Goldson 67), Hay, Doughty (Berry 81)