Cheltenham Town strikes early and seals it in stoppage time to knock Halifax Town out of the FA Cup

Jake Evans needed just 15 minutes to break the deadlock at the EV Charger Points Stadium. And just when it looked like Halifax Town would hold on to a 1-0 scoreline and drag the pain into extra time, George Miller popped up in stoppage time to make it 2-0 for Cheltenham Town in the FA Cup.

The opener came from a well-worked set piece: a free kick delivered by Kirsten Otchere found Evans on the right side of the box, and the forward finished left-footed into the top corner to make it 1-0 after 15 minutes. Before that, the match had been even, with Halifax Town even testing things with a couple of early corners and Andreas Weimann wasting a clear chance in the 11th minute with a shot that drifted just wide.

After the goal, Halifax Town didn't sit back. Ben Tollitt and Zak Gilsenan tried their luck from inside and outside the box on several occasions during the first half, but neither Tollitt's effort in the 29th minute nor Gilsenan's long-range attempts found the target. Cheltenham Town, for their part, had a good chance through Otchere in the 43rd minute, with a low shot that was saved by the visiting goalkeeper. The score stood at 1-0 at halftime.

A stoppage time finish

The second half followed the same script: Halifax Town kept pressing through Gilsenan, who tried his luck from outside the box more than once without success, while Cheltenham Town managed the lead and looked for openings with substitutions like Robbie Cundy, Freddy Willcox and George Miller, who came on in the 88th minute in place of Jake Evans, the man who scored the opener.

The decisive moment came in stoppage time, which the fourth official had extended to six minutes. A corner kick taken by Charlie McCann found the head of George Miller, who finished from close range to make it 2-0 in the 92nd minute and shut the door on any Halifax Town comeback.

The numbers behind the match

The curious thing about the night is that Halifax Town created more chances than Cheltenham Town, but without the finishing touch needed to turn them into goals.

Cheltenham Town had fewer shots overall, but were far more clinical: of their five attempts, four were on target, an efficiency rate that explains why a team with less possession and fewer shots ended up winning comfortably.

The result runs counter to what our projections showed before kickoff. In the preview, our model gave Halifax Town a 46% chance of winning, against 27% for Cheltenham Town and another 27% for a draw, with expected goals of 1.67 for the visitors and 1.25 for the home side. On paper, Halifax Town arrived as the favorite, but the match played out exactly the opposite way: Cheltenham Town was more clinical in the key moments and took both goals of the match without needing to generate much attacking volume.

With this result, Steve Cotterill's Cheltenham Town turn in a solid FA Cup performance, built on Jake Evans's efficiency and George Miller's late, decisive intervention. For John McGrath's Halifax Town, there's the sense of having created enough chances to have made the scoreline closer, but without the finishing touch needed to show for it.