Spurs and United restore order in FA Cup

LINCOLN City boss Danny Cowley hailed his giantkillers for bringing the “magic” back to the FA Cup on Saturday but, 24 hours later, Tottenham and Manchester United ted restored order to the competition. petition.

It appeared that hat Spurs manager Mauricio Pochettino and United boss Jose Mourinho nho had learnt lessons ns from Lincoln’s s shock 1-0 victoryy over Premier r League Burnley and champions Leicester’s similar loss to 10-man n Millwall of the third hird tier.

But Pochettino ino was keen to end d a tough week with h a win following defeats to Liverpool pool and Belgian side Gent in the Europa League so he fielded almost a full strength side and was rewarded by a Harry Kane hat-trick in a 3-0 victory over Fulham. Spurs will h host Millwall in the quarterfinalsquar but will be war y of the 2004 FA Cup fin finalists, who have claimedcla i t hree Premie Premier League sca lps t his season a lready.lrea M o u r i n h o , who whose side beat St Etienne 3-0 in their Europa Le League clash las last Thursday, madem several changesch to his line-up.li Unlike Leicester counterpart Claudio Ranieri, who made 10,1 it didn’t backfire as United came from 1-0 down to beat Blackburn 2-1 although Mourinho had to call on veteran Swedish striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic to come off the bench to seal victory.

“You need to make as few mistakes as possible, every game in the FA Cup is like a final, there are so many results not going to the favourites. We respect everyone,” said Ibrahimovic.

‘Galvanised our club’

Mourinho, who will relish the chance to put one over his former employers when United travel to Chelsea for t he quarterfinals, said he was fortunate t hat his players had shown the right attitude other wise they might a lso be out.

“Their approach was brave, strong. They had real competitors and if we didn’t have the right attitude from everybody we would be in real trouble,” Mourinho said.

United’s neighbours Manchester City face a troublesome replay – and an unwanted extra fixture as they battle to claw back the eight-point deficit to league leaders Chelsea – after a goalless draw with Huddersfield of the Championship. The winners will travel to Middlesbrough.

Lincoln – who had already beaten Ipswich and Brighton from the Championship – are the first non-league club since Queen’s Park Rangers in 1914 to reach the quarterfinals.

Many Premier League and Championship sides now field weakened teams in domestic cup competitions leading to accusations of disrespecting the world’s oldest senior football knockout tournament.

“I think maybe we’ve brought some of the magic back,” said Cowley, whose team face a t rip to eit her Sutton or Arsenal in t he last eight.

“It is a brilliant cup competition. Whoever says the FA Cup is dead hasn’t lived in Lincoln for the last six to eight weeks. And it has galvanised our football club.”

Leicester boss Ranieri, FIFA’s coach of t he year for his Premier League upset last year, was angr y and frustrated after seeing his relegation-t hreatened side collapse again. “I want to spea k again wit h the players and say we have to fight ever y match,” said the Ita lian. “‘Who wants to fight? Tell me’. I need t he soldiers, I need t he gladiators, because Mi l l wa l l, w it h 10 pl ayer s, showed t hey a re f a nt a st ic gladiators.”