Balkovec's late screamer sinks Celta and hands Omonia the win in the Europa League

There were barely seven minutes left when Jure Balkovec showed up on the left flank and unleashed a left-footed shot that curled into the top corner. That strike, in the 87th minute, decided a match that had been heading toward a scoreless draw until then: Omonia Nicosia 1, Celta de Vigo 0, in a Europa League league phase matchday played at GSP Stadium.

The result leaves a strange feeling when you look at what happened on the field. Celta de Vigo controlled much of the ball, with 53.7% possession, and generated considerably more danger in terms of volume, firing 19 shots to Omonia's 10. But soccer doesn't always reward the team that tries hardest, and that's exactly the story of this match.

A back-and-forth first half with no reward

The match opened with Celta pushing forward for the home goal from the early minutes. Couhaib Driouech gave a warning in the third minute with a shot that ran into the opposing defense, and shortly after came the first attempts from Alvaro Nunez and Pablo Duran, the latter set up by Nunez in a play that nearly ended in a goal in the 13th minute. Omonia answered through Ewandro and Mateo Maric testing shots from outside the box, though neither found the target.

The closing stretch of the first half had more back-and-forth than actual goals: Jean-Kevin Duverne grazed the crossbar corner at the 30th minute, Miguel Roman clipped the woodwork at the 33rd, and Senou Coulibaly, heading from point-blank range, couldn't force it in at the 38th. Sergio Carreira answered for Celta with a shot that drifted well wide. With all that, the first half closed 0-0.

The second half and the late blow

The second half kept the same script: Celta kept pressing with chances from Miguel Roman and Alvaro Nunez, and once the substitutions came in, from Hugo Gonzalez and Borja Iglesias, who entered to add freshness up front. There were stretches of heavy pressure on Omonia's goal, with several blocked shots and consecutive corners past the 80th minute, including one from Carl Starfelt that was cleared almost off the line.

But Omonia, who had sat back for much of the game, found their reward on a solo effort from Balkovec in the 87th minute, the only goal of the night. Celta kept trying until the end, with Borja Iglesias and Marcos Alonso testing shots in stoppage time (three minutes were added), but the scoreboard didn't move again.

What the numbers say

Our own xG estimate for the match, calculated from shot locations, gives Celta de Vigo 1.539 against Omonia's 0.416. That's a wide gap that backs up what was seen on the field: the Galicians created more and better chances, but they lacked the finishing touch or the luck at the right moment.

The contrast with what we published before the match is also worth noting. Our preview projection gave Omonia Nicosia a 49% chance of winning, 29% for a draw, and just 22% for Celta de Vigo, with expected goals of 1.55 for the home side and 0.98 for the visitors. In the end, the result matched the favorite from that projection, though the way the game played out, with the visitors dominating possession and shots, wasn't exactly what those numbers suggested.

What the match means in the standings

With this result, Omonia Nicosia picks up its first win of the league phase and sits in fifth place with 3 points from one match played, with a goal difference of +1. Celta de Vigo, meanwhile, remains without points after its first match, in 33rd place, with a goal difference of -1. The gap between the two sides in the table is 3 points. There's still plenty of tournament left to play, but Celta will need to turn this picture around: dominating the ball and the shot count did them no good without the goal they were missing.