Palace 2 - 4 Sunderland

Wednesday January 17 2001 - FA Cup

Crystal Palace crashed out of the FA Cup this evening, after a 4-2 loss against Sunderland at Selhurst Park.

After a 0-0 draw at the Stadium of Light last week, Sunderland won the replay at Selhurst but needed extra-time to do so. The Eagles' goals were scored by Clinton Morrison and Steve Thomson.

Sunderland started with Niall Quinn and Kevin Phillips up front in a bid to finally beat Palace in a cup competition for the first time this season.

At the start of the game, there were chances for Sunderland through Phillips and Quinn and Morrison for Palace.

It was Morrison who opened the scoring after 24 minutes by taking advantage of a poor defensive header by Alex Rae. Minutes later, Morrison had the chance to make it two but his shot did not find the net.

From then on, Sunderland dominated the match and the strike force of Phillips/Quinn had several big chances after the interval, but Palace goalkeeper Alex Kolinko did what he had to do.

The injury to defender Fan Zhiyi proved to be the turning point. He had to be substituted by Neil Ruddock.

Sunderland created more and more chances only to find Kolinko in their path, but then they found the net twice in two minutes. First Quinn, on 72, and then Phillips, on 73 minutes, turned the scoreline around.

It then seemed all over for Palace, but one minute beefore the final whistle, midfielder Thomson found the net to take the game into extra-time.

Twelve minutes into extra-time, Phillips scored his second of the night after a bad mistake by Neil Ruddock.

Then Sunderland's Daniele Dichio was sent off with a second yellow card and this could have got Palace back into the game, but it was Kevin Kilbane who sewed the game up for Sunderland.

Post match comments

Alan Smith said: "We're disappointed but not downhearted. Sunderland are second in the Premiership yet we've played them three times and they haven't beaten us in 90 minutes.

"Tactically we were good but even the best manager in the world can't stop ball bouncing over the defender's head and someone else running on to it to score."

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