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Spurs' Full Cup record against Bolton Wanderers.

FA CUP

SEASON  RD     H/A  RESULT  SCORERS
                                
24-25   2       H    1-1    Seed
        2R      A    1-0    Lane
34-35   5       H    1-1    W Evans
        5R      A    1-1    G Hunt
        5-2nd R VP   0-2  

47-48   3       A    2-0    Duquemin 2
                     aet
77-78   3       H    2-2    Hoddle, Duncan

        3R      A    1-2    P Taylor (pen)
                     aet
01-02   4       H    4-0    Anderton, Iversen,
			    Etherington, Barness (o.g)
  
FL CUP

96-97   4       A    1-6    Sheringham
01-02   5       H    6-0    Davies, Ferdinand (3)
			    Barness (o.g), Iversen 
04-05   3       A    4-3    Defoe(2), Bunjevcevic, Brown
                     aet       

Spurs have never won a league game at Bolton's Reebock Stadium, but they did win there in the Carling Cup on the last occasion the two sides met in Cup competition. The Third Round tie on 27th October, 2004 came within 4 days of a Premier League game at White Hart Lane. Spurs had lost that league game on the day that the passing of the legendary Bill Nicholson was announced. Bolton fans at The Lane had honoured the silence for Bill with full sincerity. The result was over-shadowed by the events of the day.

At that time, Bolton were flying high in fourth place, whilst Spurs were mid-table. The start of the 2004-05 season had heralded the "new structure" created by Daniel Levy of a football director (Frank Arnesen), team coach (Jacques Santini), and assistant (Martin Jol). Santini's mysterious short stay was soon to end after a 2-0 defeat at Fulham the following week-end.

A Bolton side featuring the veteran Spanish International Hierro as anchor man, Jay Jay Okocha, Kevin Nolan and El Hadji Diouf in the midfield might have been fancied to beat Spurs, but Spurs came through in an exciting extra time. A Ledley King own goal gave the home side a 27th minute lead, but Jermain Defoe latched onto a Pedro Mendes pass and hit a great equaliser just before half-time. Okocha scored from the penalty spot in the 75th minute, and it was Goran Bunjevcevic who took the game to extra time with a shot from a Ledley King header. 2-2 became 4-2 thanks to goals by Michael Brown and a second for Defoe, but former Spur and Bolton substitute Les Ferdinand made it 4-3 with fifteen nervous minutes remaining.

Bolton's goalkeeper that day was Kevin Poole, who at 46 is the goal-keeping coach at Burton Albion, for whom he made a league appearance recently. Poole is therefore the oldest player in the Football League at this time. Mind you, another 40 year old keeper, Mark Crossley, is getting occasional games for Chesterfield at the moment! Note the tenuous link with Spurs' last FA Cup Final appearance and victory in 1991!

If you travel to Bolton, you can expect the programme to have a little gloat about their 6-1 thrashing of us in the League Cup in 96-97, but maybe it will overlook the 2001-02 season, when they lost 10-0 on aggregate to us in the two Cup competitions. In December 2001, we had already beaten Sam Allardyce's men 3-2 in a televised Monday night game, before meeting them in the 5th Round of the Worthington Cup.

"Fat Sam" was in the habit of fielding weakened sides for Cup games, and the League Cup match was no exception, as Spurs ran out 6-0 winners, thanks to a Les Ferdinand hat-trick, and goals by Simon Davies, Steffen Iversen and an own goal by full back Anthony Barness, who had the misfortune to repeat the trick in the FA Cup game two months later. Barness is now 37 and was last heard of playing for Conference side Lewes last season.

In the FA Cup game which was postponed from its original Saturday date, Spurs coasted to a 4-0 victory. Darren Anderton scored from the spot after being fouled himself, Steffen Iversen swept in an Anderton cross and Matthew Etherington scored his first senior goal for the club. Barness's 73rd minute own goal wrapped up proceedings and Spurs completed an aggregate score of 13-2 over the Wanderers in three home games that season. Recently, on 3rd February we celebrated the 50th anniversary of the 13-2 win over Crewe in the FA Cup!

Former Bolton favourite Owen Coyle was appointed as manager on 8th January this year. In seven games since then he has supervised two wins, one of which was over Sheffield United in the previous round of the FA Cup, and the other against his last team - Burnley. Coyle is in danger of managing two teams that are relegated in the same season! Bolton have no scored a goal in their last three games and are now without fancied centre back Gary Cahill who has a nasty blood clot problem in his arm. Midfielder Gavin McCann is out for two months and former Spur (and former Pompey player) Sean Davis has a long term cruciate knee injury.

Perhaps Bolton's priority will be to get results in the Premier League and they have six games coming up against Wigan (twice), Blackburn, Wolves, West Ham and Sunderland from which they will hope to garner more than a few points. Look out for Croatian striker Ivan Klasnic, who is on loan from Nantes, and who has scored 6 goals in 16 appearances (7 as substitute) for Bolton this season. Klasnic has a good return for his country too, with 12 goals in 39 games.

Spurs haven't been in great scoring form either in their recent games, failing to find the net in the last two. The suspicion was that Harry Redknapp's Wednesday night team selection indicated a priority for FA Cup victory. Anything less than victory will bring a hail of criticism to Harry's feet from the fans who feel that Spurs have thrown away any chance of Champions League football. The trouble is that the team news is not great, with late decisions to be made on Ledley King, Luka Modric and even Michael Dawson. With Younes Kaboul and Kyle Walker cup-tied, the Spurs defence could be a bit thread-bare. Ekotto, Lennon and Woodgate remain out, and of course Carlo Cudicini is out for the long term.

With so many of the top teams already out, there has rarely been a better chance of success in the FA Cup, and I do fancy Spurs to make good progress. It might take a replay though, and I'll predict a 1-1 draw.

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