Archie Gray: “It was a brilliant day to be involved in, Tamworth made it tough for us”
Mon 13 January 2025, 12:30|
Tottenham Hotspur
Archie Gray thoroughly enjoyed his FA Cup experience at Tamworth - even if the National League side pushed us all the way in Sunday’s third round tie before we came home 3-0 in extra time.
Still just 18, Archie has excelled at centre-back in recent weeks - this was his ninth straight start alongside Radu Dragusin in all competitions, his 17th start and 23rd appearance this term - and this was a unique test on Tamworth’s artificial playing surface, with Tom Tonks’ now legendary long throws arriving into our penalty area from all angles - all with a national audience watching live on terrestrial TV.
Archie, our defence and goalkeeper Antonin Kinsky dealt with all that, but it still took us extra time to overcome these Staffordshire terriers, with an own goal (101 minutes) and strikes from Deki Kulusevski (107) and Brennan Johnson (118) seeing us into the fourth round, where we’ll take on Aston Villa at Villa Park next month.
Speaking on our Review Show from the Lamb Ground, we suggested to Archie that it looked like a real battle out there. “Definitely, it was a tough game for the 90 minutes, even in extra time, they pinned us down and played to their strengths,” he said.
Archie on the difficulty of getting the ball down and playing our football...
“They made it really difficult for us, like I said, not to make excuses, it’s a bit of a change for us, the different pitch, that can affect it, but ultimately, we weren’t good enough over the first 90 minutes, I thought we could have showed our quality more.”
On the message to the players before the start of extra time...
“Just to keep playing our football and that we’d eventually wear them down. Credit to them, for 90 minutes, they withstood it, in extra time I thought our quality shone through and we managed to get the result.”
On how often the first step can be the toughest as you look to progress in the FA Cup...
“Hopefully, it was a brilliant day to be involved in. I’m really grateful to be able to experience another English club and to come here to Tamworth, it was brilliant.”
