Notebook – Spurs v Morecambe

We begin our 2021/22 FA Cup campaign on Sunday as we host Morecambe at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium (2pm kick-off).

Ahead of the third round tie, we take a look at the game’s key points of interest…

1 - Seaside strangers

History will be made on Sunday as we meet Morecambe for the first time. Despite both clubs having been founded at least a century ago, neither us or the Shrimps have ever met on the pitch, either in a friendly or competitive game. The Lancashire outfit will be the 236th different club we have faced in all competitions in our history and the latest different English club we have faced since meeting Marine in this round of last season’s FA Cup. Meanwhile, they will be the latest different league club we have met since facing Rochdale in the fifth round of this competition in February, 2018.

2 - Morecambe’s FA Cup run

To make it to this stage of the FA Cup, League One Morecambe have already had to come through two rounds of action. Having entered the competition in the first round, the Shrimps defeated League Two Newport County 1-0 before edging past Northern Premier League Premier Division side Buxton (level seven) by the same scoreline.

3 - Shrimps’ league suffering

A Football League club since 2007, having achieved their first ever promotion out of non-league with a dramatic play-off final victory over Exeter City, Morecambe made history once more in the play-offs last season as they earned promotion to League One for the first time with an extra-time victory over Newport at Wembley back in May.

They made a promising start to their debut campaign in the third tier as they picked up 14 points from their first 10 outings, including a famous 1-0 home scalp of four-time First Division champions Sheffield Wednesday. However, a run of just one win in their following 13 matches has left them fighting for survival.

They do, however, come into this game off the back of a win – and what a win it was! Having gone 3-0 down within half-an-hour at home to bottom side Doncaster Rovers last Sunday, four second-half goals, including one from Jon Obika (more on him later), saw them to a remarkable victory and moved them out of the relegation zone.

4 - Cole’s for goals

Morecambe’s dangerman this season has undoubtedly been Cole Stockton. Despite his side currently struggling in League One, Stockton sits second in the goalscoring charts with 15 goals to his name so far – his best-ever league return and the season is only at the halfway stage. Currently averaging a league goal every 132 minutes, the former Tranmere forward has also scored twice in the League Cup this season, while he was also the man that fired his side through to the third round of the FA Cup with the sole goal away to Buxton.

5 - Morecambe in the third round

Having not appeared in the FA Cup third round since 2003 when they travelled to then-Championship Ipswich Town, Morecambe have now reached this stage of the competition in back-to-back campaigns.

Last season, having defeated non-league outfits Maldon & Tiptree and Solihull Moors in the first and second rounds, the Shrimps earned a trip to Chelsea this time last year but, in that meeting, they were swept aside 4-0. That was just the fourth time they have reached this stage of the competition and they have never progressed further.

6 - Morecambe against Premier League sides

That defeat to Chelsea was Morecambe’s latest encounter against a Premier league side – a series of fixtures they have struggled in to date. In six meetings with top-flight sides since the formation of the Premier League in 1992, the Shrimps have fallen in each of those matches, conceding 20 goals across them and scoring just once. That sole goal came in a 2-1 home defeat to Bournemouth in the second round of the League Cup back in August, 2016.

7 - Spurs and Shrimps

Among the travelling party on Sunday, there should have been two products of our youth system, however, the report of a positive COVID-19 case by Morecambe means one will be unable to take their part in the game. That positive case for the Shrimps unfortunately befell their manager Stephen Robinson – a former midfielder who came through our youth ranks in the early 1990s and went on to make two first team appearances for us in 1993. One of our former youth prospects who will be at the game, though, is Morecambe forward Jonathan Obika. Jon, who moved to the Mazuma Stadium in the summer, progressed through our Academy in the late noughties and went on to play four times in our colours, including once in this competition as we fell 2-1 to Leeds in the fourth round in 2012/13.

8 - Our third round record

The FA Cup is a competition we have a rich history in. Having entered the competition 116 times to date, we have gone all the way on eight occasions and still hold the record as the only non-league club to have ever lifted the famous old cup having done so in 1901.

In terms of the third round, we have played 139 ties at this stage and have lost just 31 of those – and have tasted just one defeat at this stage in the last 15 seasons. Meanwhile, when we have been drawn at home in this round, we haven’t lost since January, 1990, when Southampton ran out 3-1 winners. The last time we fell to lower league opposition in the competition was back in January, 2013, in the aforementioned fourth round tie with then-Championship side Leeds. We haven’t lost an FA Cup game to a third-tier side for 34 years, having been edged 2-1 by Port Vale in January, 1988.

9 - History at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium

The weekend of the FA Cup third round has forever been an illustrious date on the English football calendar and, for the first time since it opened, Tottenham Hotspur Stadium will host its first such fixture on Sunday. While the 2019/20 season saw us host Middlesbrough in a third-round replay at our north London home, this will be the first time we have played an original tie at this stage there. It will be our first third round tie in N17 in five years with our last such game seeing us win 2-0 against Aston Villa in January, 2017.

10 - Conte in the FA Cup

This a competition Antonio Conte knows very well. He might have only overseen two FA Cup campaigns in his career to date but, in each one of them, he has made the final – and in 2018, he went all the way. Taking Chelsea to Wembley in the 2016/17 season having progressed past Peterborough, Brentford, Wolves, Manchester United and us, they then fell at the last hurdle to Arsenal. The next year, however, Antonio would not be stopped with the Blues as, after earning victories over Norwich, Newcastle, Hull, Leicester and Southampton, he then defeated Manchester United 1-0 in the May showpiece at the national stadium to take home the silverware.