Great drama but England left to sweat over replays

14 April 2012

The magic of the FA Cup produced two of the season's most dramatic matches but there was a sting in the tail for Steve McClaren.

England's head coach will spend the week deliberating on his squad for the crucial Euro 2008 qualifiers against Israel and Andorra, but he will be sweating on the fitness of 16 senior players when the squad convenes on Monday afternoon.

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Paul Robinson, Gary Neville, John Terry, Rio Ferdinand, Michael Dawson, Jonathan Woodgate, Ashley Cole, Wayne Bridge, Frank Lampard, Aaron Lennon, Shaun Wright-Phillips, Stewart Downing, Michael Carrick, Jermaine Jenas, Jermain Defoe and Wayne Rooney may all be involved in replays that evening. And there are no guarantees that his squad will emerge unscathed.

First Manchester United and Middlesbrough drew thrillingly at The Riverside on Saturday, then Chelsea and Tottenham finished level after an extraordinary Sunday afternoon.

But it was a credit to Jose Mourinho and Martin Jol that they both went for broke at Stamford Bridge.

They were seen in discussion before the quarter-final tie and it emerged that they had agreed to avoid a replay at all costs. Judging by the way Jol's side began this tie, they wanted to be in the draw for the semi-finals before the break.

Lennon, a surprise starter in the centre of midfield, was at his impish best and Dimitar Berbatov threatened to tear Chelsea's defence to shreds.

Jol said: "I didn't want a replay and neither did Mourinho. They played in the Champions League on Tuesday and we played in the UEFA Cup on Thursday, but we went for the win.

"I told the players before the game that it was possible, but we can't sit down and blame one another. Even when we scored a third, I felt we needed a fourth. We should have had a penalty (when a Chelsea defender handballed Defoe's shot), but it is a great compliment that we have not lost here. We have played in 17 cup-ties this season and never lost inside 90 minutes."

They certainly did not deserve to lose this one and although Spurs conceded the psychological ground to Chelsea after Lampard and Salomon Kalou completed the home side's comeback, they can still be reasonably confident of success at White Hart Lane.

It was only four months ago that Tottenham pulled off one of the biggest shocks of the season when they beat the Premiership champions 2-1, but a replay of this intensity is a match that both managers could do without.

After their capture of the Carling Cup, Mourinho's side are still chasing honours on three fronts — Premiership, Champions League and FA Cup — but the season is showing signs of catching up with them.

It took Ricardo Quaresma's fabulous goal to spark them into life in the Champions League against Porto last Tuesday, but there appeared to be no way back yesterday when Hossam Ghaly put Spurs into a 3-1 lead before the break.

Mourinho admitted: "At half-time, we were out of the competition against a good team. The players accepted the risks we took to get back into it and we are happy."

Predictably, it was Lampard who dragged them back when he cancelled out Berbatov's opener and he ignored the taunts of the Tottenham supporters singing, "You let your country down", to pull them back into the tie.

With Chelsea in the ascendency, Kalou converted Ricardo Carvalho's cross four minutes from time and although Mourinho threw bodies forward in search of a winner, they were out of time.

It ensures a mouth-watering replay at White Hart Lane a week tonight and one man is guaranteed to be glued to the screen.

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