MANCHESTER: Premier League Leeds United suffered the biggest upset of the FA Cup third round when they fell to a 3-0 defeat by fourth-tier Crawley Town yesterday but Tottenham Hotspur enjoyed a 5-0 win at minnows Marine AFC.
Manchester City and Chelsea also eased through with comfortable victories against lower-league opponents.
A brilliant solo strike from Nick Tsaroulla in the 50th minute put League Two Crawley in front after a first half in which Leeds had caused them few problems.
Three minutes later the West Sussex club were 2-0 up after an error from Leeds keeper Kiko Casilla who let an Ashley Nadesan shot squeeze in at the near post.
The impressive Nadesan had a hand in Crawley’s third when his low shot was parried out by Casilla, only for Jordan Tunnicliffe to pounce and drill the ball home.
Jose Mourinho’s Tottenham travelled to Merseyside to face eighth-tier Marine, no doubt with some degree of trepidation given the Cup has never produced a bigger mis-match.
The non-league side nearly gave Spurs a shock in the 20th minute when Neil Kengni struck the bar with a long-range effort which former England keeper Joe Hart opted to let go only for the ball to dip late and strike the woodwork.
Yet four minutes later Carlos Vinicius opened the scoring and quickly added a second – both finishes coming from close-range.
Another Brazilian, Lucas Moura, then curled in a free kick for the third before Vinicius completed his hat-trick in the 37th minute with a left-footed curler.
Alfie Devine, who became Spurs’ youngest player at 16 years and 163 days old, came on as a substitute at the break and scored on the hour with a well-taken strike that zipped in the near post.
Bernardo Silva scored two goals and Phil Foden another as Manchester City strolled to a 3-0 win over Championship (second-tier) Birmingham City.
Frank Lampard’s Chelsea were also up against League Two opposition but avoided any embarrassment with a comfortable 4-0 victory over Morecambe.
Mason Mount gave Chelsea an early lead at Stamford Bridge with a sweetly struck shot from outside the box and German striker Timo Werner scored his first goal in two months with a simple tap-in before the break.
Callum Hudson-Odoi and Kai Havertz also got their names on the scoresheet as Chelsea secured their first win in four games in all competitions.
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