Halifax Town will be looking to continue their promotion push from the National League when they welcome Grimsby Town to The Shay on Tuesday evening.
The sides only played the reverse fixture on January 3 due to fixture rearrangements, with the scoreline ending 1-1 at Blundell Park thanks to a late equaliser from Grimsby.
Match preview
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Halifax's thumping 4-0 win over Eastleigh at The Shay on Saturday afternoon took Pete Wild's side to the summit of the National League table, overtaking Chesterfield in the process, who were instead playing at Stamford Bridge against Chelsea in the FA Cup.
The Shaymen capitalised on the opportunity with ease in the end, with Jordan Slew's brace being followed by further goals from Jamie Allen and Matthew Warburton in the second half.
After back-to-back 1-1 draws with fellow promotion-hopefuls Chesterfield and then Tuesday's opponents Grimsby, it was the perfect performance and result to return to winning ways.
As a result, Halifax extended their unbeaten run to six matches in the process, in what has been an excellent opening to the campaign that has led to a quest for promotion to the football league.
With most of the sides in and around Halifax not featuring in midweek, Wild's team have a glorious chance to now extend their lead at the top of the table to four points, and place the pressure on their rivals in the process.
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Meanwhile, Grimsby's last match was in fact the reverse fixture eight days prior to this meeting at The Shay.
After Kian Spence had netted for their opponents shortly after half time, Jordan Maguire-Drew was the hero for Paul Hurst's side when he equalised in the final minute of normal time.
That draw did at least put an end to Grimsby's four consecutive defeats in all competitions, but it remains a dreadful run of form that the Mariners find themselves on.
It is now just one win, a draw and eight defeats across their last 10 fixtures, as their hopes of immediately returning to League Two have been hit hard.
As a result of their recent struggles over the last couple of months, Hurst's men have fallen down to 10th in the National League table, with five points now being between themselves and Notts County in the final playoff place.
After initially flying out of the blocks in August and winning 10 of their opening 13 matches across all competitions in the 2021-22 campaign, Grimsby looked set to achieve their goal comfortably, but unless form can be turned around soon, Hurst could well feel the pressure mounting as his side falter in the promotion race.
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Team News
Halifax may look to rest Matthew Stenson on Tuesday evening, with the striker making his first start in over 12 months against Eastleigh on Saturday.
He may drop to the bench, with Allen earning a starting spot following his goal as a substitute in that game.
Jack Senior could also come into the three-man backline for Jay Benn, in an otherwise probably unchanged side for Wild.
As for the visitors, they will be assessing the gash to captain Giles Coke's shin that he picked up against Halifax on January 3.
John McAtee will return from suspension in this game, but Lenell John-Lewis will sit out through his own suspension once more, following his red card at Stockport County two games ago.
Halifax Town possible starting lineup:
Johnson; Maher, Bradbury, Senior; Warren, Green, Warburton, Spence; Waters; Allen, Slew
Grimsby Town possible starting lineup:
Crocombe; Efete, Waterfall, Pearson, Crookes; Coke, Fox; Sousa, Clifton, Maguire-Drew; McAtee
We say: Halifax Town 2-0 Grimsby Town
It is likely to be a tight game between two sides chasing promotion, but Halifax hold home advantage and are in the much better form, so they should come away with the win here.
Grimsby deserved their hard-earned draw at Halifax recently, but with Halifax now returning to their own patch, they will be expected to extend their lead at the top of the table to pile the pressure on Hurst at the visitors.
Top tip
Matthew Tranter
Data Analysis
Our analysis of all available data, including recent performances and player stats up until an hour before kickoff, suggested the most likely outcome of this match was a Halifax Town win with a probability of 50.89%. A win for Grimsby Town had a probability of 25.77% and a draw had a probability of 23.3%.
The most likely scoreline for a Halifax Town win was 2-1 with a probability of 9.65%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 1-0 (9.07%) and 2-0 (8.05%). The likeliest Grimsby Town win was 1-2 (6.52%), while for a drawn scoreline it was 1-1 (10.87%). The actual scoreline of 1-0 was predicted with a 9.1% likelihood. Our team at Sports Mole and our data analysis both correctly predicted that Halifax Town would win this match.
