Half the Championship gone

Last updated : 09 January 2005 By Tony Scholes

Oooh David Eyres
Three of those seven beat Premiership opposition with West Ham claiming their win away from home with a 1-0 victory at Norwich courtesy of a Marlon Harewood goal whilst Sheffield United and Sunderland were successful against Aston Villa and Crystal Palace respectively.

Villa went out after a 3-1 defeat at Bramall Lane, the same scoreline that saw the Clarets put them out of the Carling Cup. The Blades deserved to win but the who game changed on a dreadful decision that allowed Andy Liddel to put the home side 2-1 up when clearly some distance offside. It was 3-1 a minute later and that was that.

Sunderland came from a goal down to beat Crystal Palace at the Stadium of Light to complete the three wins against the Premiership clubs.

Coventry, Derby, Nottingham Forest and Wolves were the other winners and all of them beat other Championship clubs.

Only three clubs in the Championship were rewarded with ties against clubs from a lower league, all at home and none of them were able to win. Leicester were held by League One strugglers Blackpool whilst Reading only survived against Swansea City with an equaliser two minutes from time by Ivar Ingimarsson.

Rotherham were the club to suffer the worst defeat of the weekend, they were beaten 3-0 at home by Yeovil in front of a crowd of just over 5,000.


It all means that twelve of us, exactly half, will be in tomorrow’s draw with four facing replays and the Clarets still to get their tie underway.

There’s no doubt which result went down best with Burnley fans and that was Oldham’s 1-0 win over KKMC at Boundary Park. It’s not that we have any particular liking for Oldham but just about everyone asked said it was because of David Eyres, still a regular just over a month short of his 41st birthday.

Thanks too to Peterborough who by winning 2-0 in Milton Keynes ensured there would be no big and underserved pay day for Franchise - well done Posh.

The performance of the day though was Exeter’s at Old Trafford. It takes some believing but the result was Manchester United 0 Exeter City 0 – it has wiped out the Supporters Trust run club’s debts and also given them a fantastic night to look forward to at the real St. James’ Park.

Burnley will be ball number 24 in tomorrow’s draw – Burnley or Liverpool to be exact. The numbers in the draw are:

1 Arsenal
2 Middlesbrough
3 Manchester United or Exeter City
4 Everton
5 Leicester City or Blackpool
6 Derby County
7 Sunderland
8 Wolverhampton Wanderers
9 Newcastle United
10 Colchester United
11 Tottenham Hotspur
12 Reading or Swansea City
13 Birmingham City
14 Hartlepool United or Boston United
15 Peterborough United
16 Oldham Athletic
17 Chelsea
18 Cardiff City or Blackburn Rovers
19 Charlton Athletic
20 West Ham United
21 Sheffield United
22 West Bromwich Albion
23 Yeovil Town
24 Burnley or Liverpool
25 AFC Bournemouth
26 Coventry City
27 Watford or Fulham
28 Bolton Wanderers
29 Portsmouth
30 Southampton
31 Nottingham Forest
32 Brentford