As always, the first weekend of January means the third round of the FA Cup in England. A time for small clubs to take on the big boys and dream of the impossible upset, minnows vs sharks, David vs Goliath etc etc. But enough about plucky Liverpool's match against Man Utd tomorrow. Da-dum cchhhhhhh.
There were quite a few potential "cupsets" this year, and quite a few of them have actually happened, mainly against the North-East's big 3. Mr. Karren Brady's League two team Burton Albion got 2 late goals to beat Middlesbrough 2-1 and reach the 4th round for the first time in their history. As well, Sunderland lost 2-1 to League One Notts County, and Newcastle lost 3-1 at League 2 Stevenage! Combined with Hartlepool losing to Watford, and that's a weekend to warm any Darlington fan's heart. Stevenage's win prompted another great small club tradition, the celebratory pitch invasion, which unfortunately had an ugly moment when one of the Stevenage players got punched.
Other Premier League teams getting knocked out were West Brom, beaten by Reading, and Blackpool who lost at Southampton. The non-league clubs did themselves proud in defeat, York City holding Bolton goalless for 83 minutes before losing 2-0, in front of 4,900 travelling fans. Dover Athletic's fairytale run ended with a 2-0 defeat at League One Huddersfield. Crawley also play, against Derby County on Monday, but Crawley are the non-league version of Chelsea or Man city, rich and obnoxiously big spending, so I don't really find much romance in that tie.
Probably the most entertaining game of the day was actually a second round replay between two League Two teams, Hereford and Lincoln, which saw 7 goals, each one changing the result, before Hereford finally escaped with a 4-3 win.
All in all, very satisfying.
No comments:
Post a Comment