Why Mark Crosssley thought FC Halifax Town deserved to beat Chesterfield

After an even first-half the hosts were by far the better team in the second 45 and deservedly won it when Jack Redshaw, who was fouled by substitute Jonathan Smith in the box on 66 minutes, then scored the resulting penalty.

“We did not play well enough with the ball,” Crossley said.

“We can’t fault their effort again but our quality on the ball was poor until Liam Mandeville came on the pitch but that is in hindsight we just wish we had put him on a bit earlier.

“The last thing I said at half-time was don’t give cheap free-kicks away let alone penalties and that is exactly what we did.

“You give yourself no chance if you give away cheap penalties like that.

“I’ve looked back at it and I have no complaints at all.”

Mike Fondop had Chesterfield’s best chance in the first-half but headed a Jay Sheridan cross narrowly wide.

Crossley said: “Mike Fondop has been in great goalscoring form and first-half he had the best chance of the first-half for both teams with his header, probably should have scored.”

And Fondop had another opportunity but chose to shoot instead of squaring the ball to Scott Boden who was in a better position.

“He (Fondop) broke their defence and shot when he should have passed to Scott Boden but he didn’t and these are the narrow margins that we keep going on about,” Crossley added.

Smith replaced Josef Yarney on the hour mark with the right-back appearing to be feeling his hamstring.

“We had to bring Josef Yarney off because he has just recovered from a hamstring injury and he was feeling it so we did not want him to pull that,” Crossley added.

“We have been a bit short of bodies so Smudge (Smith) is your natural, experienced player that you put there and just a rash challenge gives the penalty away.

“They (Halifax) were the better team today.”