In January, Tottenham Hotspur will travel to Crosby, on the north-west coast of England,
to face Marine FC in the third round of the FA Cup. It is now 149 years since
the competition was founded, making it the oldest club cup in the world,
and this tie – which pits Premier League Spurs against Marine, of the Northern Premier League,
North West Division – is the greatest mismatch in its history.
Jose Mourinho’s side are from English football’s summit.
They play in a billion pound stadium and boast a team full of internationals. Marine,
who are managed by Neil Young, come from the eighth rung,
where clubs depend on volunteers and part-time players have to train around their day jobs.
And the profile of the two managers reflects that disparity:
Mourinho, of course, has won the Champions League twice, as well as domestic league titles in Spain,
Italy England and Portugal. Young, an ex-professional player who was forced
into early retirement by injury suffered in his mid-twenties, coached Altrincham,
Chester, Colwyn Bay, Stockport and Halifax prior to taking over at Rossett Park in 2018.
The journeys taken to reach this stage of the FA Cup also describe teams from different worlds.
As a Premier League side, Tottenham have the privilege of bye into the third round.
Marine, however, had to win seven games to get this far,
slogging through four qualifying rounds just to reach the main draw and the first-round proper.
After beating Barnoldswick Town all the way back on September 12th, they came through
games again Frickley Athletic, Runcorn Linnets, Nantwich Town, Chester and Colchester United,
before a 120th minute winner defeated Havant and Waterlooville after extra time.
The game’s only goal was scored by Niall Cummins, a PE teacher,
after rubbish collector James Barrigan’s cross had been knocked back into the six-yard box.
A picture it wasn’t – Cummins missed his attempt at a dividing header,
steering the ball in accidentally and off his back – but it was enough put his club in very rare air.
Marine have actually reached the third round once before, when they faced Crewe Alexandra in 1992.
But this is only the second time in history that a club from the eighth
level of English football, entering at the beginning of the qualifying rounds,
has made it this far. Southall were the first, breaking that new ground in the 1935-36 season.
For Marine, the reward for matching their feat is Tottenham, and a game which will
be broadcast live on the BBC and provide an invaluable source of income at a critical moment.
"Christmas has very much come early for us," Marine chairman
Paul Leary told the Liverpool Echo shortly after the draw was made.
"To say that this cup run has been a godsend for us would be an understatement. It has been
a massive shot in the arm for this football club. Since the onset of the pandemic we had to close
down our club function rooms and weren't able to allow fans into the ground for a long time.”
It’s no hyperbole. Crosby is in Merseyside, one of the areas recently reclassified as Tier 3
under the UK Government’s lockdown regulations , meaning that – again, despite selling 500
tickets for the Spurs game - the match will have to take place behind closed doors.
The restrictions leave non-league football on a knife edge.
Without the protection of the vast broadcasting contracts which exist at the top of the pyramid,
clubs like Marine – who are dependent on matchday income and the renting of their facilities
for social functions – remain extremely vulnerable. The £75,000 reward for being
broadcast live on television will go some way to securing their future.
In an interview with The Telegraph, Chairman Leary also hoped that it would save jobs,
with nine of Marine’s staff having been furloughed in 2020. More optimistically,
there’s also the hope of installing a new pitch at season’s end.
Unfortunately, no Tottenham fans will be allowed to travel to the game. It’s
a great shame because Rossett Park, with its perimeter lined by terraced houses,
private gardens and idiosyncrasies, is the quintessential image of British non-league
football and the chance to visit seems unlikely to come around again soon.
But the unusual times have brought out football’s benevolent side.
It was announced in early December that in lieu of the situation, Tottenham season ticket holders
would be given a free ticket to a Marine home game of their choice during the 2021-22 season.
In response, Spurs fans have been active. A supporter-run website in the United States raised
almost $13,000 for Marine via a GoFundMe page and, in a separate campaign, Tottenham fans who would
otherwise have made the trip to the North-West were invited to donate what they might have paid
for their tickets. So far, that’s raised almost another £2,000 that will be donated to the club.
It’s the FA Cup at its very best. It’s the football at its most intriguing, certainly,
but also the competition’s egalitarian reputation come to life.
The biggest day in Marine’s 126-year history might also be its most important.