Moment minnows dared to dream
So nearly a Cheltenham festival but late burst leaves them heartbroken
IT LOOKED really rather too comfortable in the bar where Manchester City were made to change at the Jonny-Rocks Stadium. High-backed chairs, the kind you sit on when you attend a speed awareness course in a meeting room at a three-star hotel on a roundabout on the outskirts of town, were spaced around the Premier Suite. The players’ kit was arranged neatly beside each one.
It was spacious, too. City had been allocated the Jamie Victory Lounge as well as the Premier Suite in order to satisfy Covid protocols. It might not have quite been the changing rooms at the Etihad, which are so luxurious they have become a match-day tourist attraction for fans who gaze down at them in awe, but the players had probably seen worse.
Pep Guardiola had pleaded light-heartedly with his hosts not to serve his players beer in the bar and he got his wish. The only alcohol was in the hand-sanitiser. And the pitch was as even and neat as the green baize of a snooker table. Elland Road played like the surface of the moon earlier in the season compared to this. All in all, it felt like Cheltenham Town had missed a trick. They had been far too nice.
The reality, though, was that the hospitality of the League Two minnows ended as soon as the players took the pitch. Perhaps City were lulled into a false sense of security but Cheltenham gave them an almighty scare before the Premier League giants scored three goals in the last nine minutes to win 3-1 and spare themselves the ignominy of being victims of one of this old competition’s greatest giant-killings.
This was a wonderful fourthround tie, the kind that epitomised so much of the appeal of the FA Cup, the kind that showcased the skill and the iron will of some of the lower league teams who get their moment in the limelight to show that they could have been contenders in this sport, too, if the cards had fallen differently.
When Alfie May put the Robins ahead with half an hour to go, thoughts of Hereford United and Newcastle, Chelsea and Bradford, Sutton United and Coventry City, Wrexham and Arsenal and, yes, Halifax Town and Manchester City went through the minds of FA Cup aficionados everywhere.
Magnificently resilient in defence, Cheltenham came within nine minutes of writing their names alongside those giant-killers before their hearts were broken.
In the opening stages, City had tried to accept Cheltenham’s hospitality with indecent haste. Less than a minute had gone when Riyad Mahrez drifted a ball forward into the path of Gabriel Jesus. Jesus seemed to have lifted the ball over Cheltenham goalkeeper Josh Griffiths but Griffiths managed to reach out a hand and tip the ball away just when it seemed City had taken the lead.
If that was a decent save, it was nothing compared to the rescue act performed by Cheltenham skipper Ben Tozer 10 minutes later. When a cross found its way to Benjamin Mendy on the left side of the Cheltenham area, Mendy met it with a blistering left-foot shot that was flying into the net until Tozer flung himself in its path and somehow diverted it over the bar.
City have won this competition six times and they fielded a strong side against a League Two team that sits 72 places below them in the football pyramid.
The Premier League title favourites made 10 changes from the team that beat Aston Villa on Wednesday night but when the players coming in include Aymeric Laporte, Mendy, Fernandinho, Ferran Torres, Mahrez and Jesus, Guardiola was not expecting to be the victims of an upset.
City should have taken the lead soon after Tozer’s heroics when a misplaced clearance by the home side fell to Mendy on the left. He played in Phil Foden whose pinpoint cross was met eight yards out by Torres. Torres had time and space but he hit his shot weakly and too close to Griffiths who pushed it out before it was hacked clear.
They missed another chance to take the lead when Fernandinho drilled a long ball out to Mendy, who volleyed his cross into the feet of Foden, and he hit his shot first time but without conviction and it dribbled harmlessly wide of Griffiths’ near post.
Ten minutes before half-time and soon after the game was halted by a firework display behind the Colin Farmer Stand. This is becoming something of a trend at FA Cup ties this season. The same happened during Stockport’s third-round tie with West Ham a fortnight ago.
Sergio Aguero was missing because he was isolating following a diagnosis of Covid-19 and there was another reminder of how much he is missed when, seven minutes after half-time, City squandered the best chance of the game so far.
Jesus stole behind the back four to run on to a brilliant through ball from Foden but even though he curled his shot right-footed beyond Griffiths, it bounced away to safety off the outside of the post.
City soon paid for that profligacy. Just under an hour had gone when Tozer launched another of his long throws from the left deep into the City box. Charlie Raglan leapt with Laporte and flicked the ball on and May, who had been a constant irritant for the City defence, reacted quickest to lash the ball past Zack Steffen and high into the net.
City threw everything at Cheltenham now. Another brilliant through ball from Foden released Mahrez with 20 minutes to go but once again, Griffiths refused to be beaten. Mahrez tried to clip the ball past him with his right foot but Griffiths blocked it with his body.
It felt then that City were never going to score, that this was destined to be Cheltenham’s day.
Cheltenham held out until nine minutes from time when one of City’s blizzard of substitutes, Joao Cancelo, curled a cross into the box and Foden ghosted in at the back post to volley it past Griffiths.
Suddenly, City looked liberated and two minutes later, they took the lead. Fernandinho floated a pass over the defence, Jesus controlled it, turned and lashed his shot past Griffiths. Cheltenham appealed desperately for offside as if they could not quite believe their dream was dying but the decision was tight and there was no VAR.
Torres scored a third deep in added time after a cross from Ilkay Gundogan, which was a final blow the home team did not deserve. They had come so, so close to writing their names large in the history of this competition but now there was no way back.