Following FC Halifax Town’s penalty win over Maidenhead United in the FA Trophy, manager Chris Millington spoke to Shaymen TV to give his thoughts on the game.
“It’s a tie that we’ve made harder than it needed to be,” Millington said. “We were slow to get going which is disappointing after the last two starts we’ve had against Oldham and Barnet. In those we were able to start fast, we dominated Oldham for the first 20 minutes at their place and then against Barnet we started brightly and scored early. That was certainly our objective today, to start brightly and start with that kind of energy again. As a staff, from our analysis we knew Maidenhead at home conceded 64% of their goals in the first half so we really wanted to get out there and impose ourselves on them in the first half, but we failed to do that. It wasn’t until the latter stages, where I thought Harvey Gilmour, when we moved him centrally, really controlled the game. Other than that, we weren’t really in control of what was more of a basketball game. But, I was delighted with the result.
Town created a few chances in the opening stages but, as with most chances in the game, failed to really test the keeper.
“We had the better of it but we failed to secure possession in the opposition half,” Millington told Shaymen TV. “That resulted in us giving away a lot of silly free kicks again in our own half because the ball wasn’t staying up the pitch long enough, then we’re having to make recovery runs and tackles in our own half. It resulted in a lot of free kicks which put us under pressure and we know that Maidenhead are strong in terms of set-pieces, it’s a real feature of theirs this season. So, there were aspects of our play in the first half that we wanted to be better at, we weren’t as bright as we have been in the first half of the last two games. So, that’s something we’ve got to look at and make sure we put it right for Tuesday night.”
Once again Sam Johnson made a crucial save in the penalty shout-out before Jordan Slew netted the winner to send Town through to the quarter final.
“I was saying to Paul Oakes, the goalkeeper coach, by the third penalty, just questioning some of Sam’s approaches to the penalties, but how dare I, how foolish of me,” Millington jokes. “But then he does what Sam does and makes the save which helps see us through. So he’s not only a good keeper in penalty shoot-outs, but he’s also a good omen.”
Up next for the Shaymen sees another long trip, this time to Southend United as we return to league action.
“It’s a long trip and another difficult game to play,” Millington told Shaymen TV. “I know that, as a club, they’ve got their challenges and a massive amount of credit needs to go to their players and staff for maintaining the level of form under such difficult circumstances. It is difficult, but they are highly motivated, they are a very good team. They play a really nice, attractive brand of football. They’ve got energy and attacking threat up top, not least Jake Hyde, who we are very familiar with. They’ve a number of attacking options and a very solid back three. It’ll be an exciting game and these are the types of games we really look forward to, the ones that take a little bit of time to prepare for. Some of the games we have to prepare for are more about the heart, desire, and resilience to direct play. This’ll take a bit more than that and it gives something to really get our teeth into.”
Watch the full interview on Shaymen TV.
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