The Malta Independent on Sunday
Lincoln 1st non-league team in FA Cup last 8 since 1914
Football in the UK
Lincoln became the first nonleague team to reach the FA Cup quarterfinals in more than a century by beating Premier League side Burnley 1-0 with an 89thminute goal yesterday.
Sean Raggett scored the most famous goal in Lincoln's 133year history, with goal-line technology needed to confirm that his close-range header at the far post crossed the line.
Having already eliminated second-tier League Championship teams Ipswich and Brighton in a remarkable run to the last 16 that started in October, fifth-tier leader Lincoln ousted a topflight club that held runaway Premier League leader Chelsea to a draw only last weekend.
"It's life-changing for us," Lincoln manager Danny Cowley said. "It's game-changing for the profile of our club. Football at our level is not romantic. For them to have this moment in the limelight is something special."
The last non-league team to reach the FA Cup quarterfinals was Queens Park Rangers in 1914. Lincoln was playing in the last 16 for the first time in 130 years.
"It's unheard of in modern-day football," Raggett said. "It shows just what an achievement this is."
Lincoln's contingent of 3,210 visiting fans was singing "We're going to Wembley" 15 minutes after the final whistle at Turf Moor, in front of the team's celebrating players.
Lincoln striker Matt Rhead, who only four years ago was working for a company that made construction machinery, said it was "chaos, pandemonion" in the dressing room afterward.
"It is unbelievable," he said. "When we started back in October, it was a dream."
Fortified by bacon rolls and cups of coffee and tea laid on by the club, hundreds of Lincoln supporters boarded coaches early yesterday and traveled from Sincil Bank in the East Midlands to Turf Moor, a quaint ground with quintessentially English views of rows of terraced houses and old cotton mills.
"Impvasion" — a reference to Lincoln's nickname of The Imps — briefly trended on Twitter.
Lincoln, unsurprisingly, had sold out its allocation and the team's fans were in good voice before and during the match, especially when an upset was looking increasingly likely.
Rhead, a giant throwback of a striker, caused problems with his height and presence. Nathan Arnold, a winger who has worked as a hairdresser in his spare time, was a constant threat down the right with his pace.
Lincoln tried to play its passing game when it could but was tight at the back, even when Burnley threw everything at the visitors in a tense last five minutes.
Eighty-one places separate Burnley and Lincoln in English soccer's pyramid but there was no obvious difference between the sides on a chilly day in northern England.
In the end, the key moment came when a deep corner was headed back across goal and Raggett rose above a crowd of Burnley defenders at the far post to nod goalward and over the line — just.
"No excuses," Burnley manager Sean Dyche said. "We're unfortunately part of their fairytale."
Lincoln has made nearly 1 million pounds ($1.24 million) from this cup run, putting the club back in the black for the first time in years. There will be much more cash coming its way after the quarterfinals, the draw for which is made on Sunday.
"It's brought the city together," said Chris Ashton, a lifelong Lincoln fan who helped organize supporters' coaches.
Cowley said Lincoln had "brought some of the magic back" to the world's oldest club competition.
"Whoever said the FA Cup is dead hasn't been in Lincoln the last six weeks," he said.
Another non-league team, Sutton, hosts Arsenal in a fifthround match on Monday.
In the other matches Manchester City were held at Championship side Huddersfield, and will now have to replay.
Champions Leicester City are out of the FA Cup after losing to League One side Millwall.
Middlesbrough advanced with a 3-2 win over Oxford United.
Chelsea remain on course for the double as they beat Wolves 2-0 with second half goals from Pedro and Diego Costa. Yesterday Today Tomorrow Yesterday