Sweet revenge as Chelsea wallop Spurs

Tottenham 0 Chelsea 4

Tottenham 0 Chelsea 4

Chelsea avenged their 5-1 Worthington Cup humiliation in spectacular style today as they routed London rivals Tottenham 4-0 to march into the semi-finals of the FA Cup.

Goals from William Gallas, Eidur Gudjohnsen, Graeme Le Saux and Gudjohnsen again settled a red-hot tie to leave the Blues celebrating and effectively end Tottenham's season.

Not even the dismissal of Le Saux after 76 minutes for a second bookable offence, a wild tackle on substitute Mauricio Taricco, could spoil the day for Chelsea, who returned to winning ways against Spurs, having now lost just once to them in their last 29 meetings.

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Chelsea took the lead after 11 minutes thanks to an error from the Spurs goalkeeper.

Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink curled in a corner from the left, which Sullivan flapped at, helping it on to the far post. Mario Melchiot knocked the ball back across the face of the goal and Gallas bundled it home from close range.

Spurs came within inches of an equaliser after 38 minutes when Darren Anderton crossed from the right and Ferdinand saw his downward header come back off the far post with Carlo Cudicini beaten. That was to be their one and only real hope of a goal, and the game quickly slipped away from them.

Chelsea doubled their lead three minutes after the break. Le Saux hoisted a long ball forward, and as the Tottenham defence stepped up Gudjohnsen was left all on his own with a clear run at goal.

The cool Icelandic international made no mistake as he carried the ball inside the area and drilled it past Sullivan.

Glenn Hoddle and the Tottenham bench were convinced the goal should have been disallowed for offside, and their team were left with a mountain to climb.

The game was put beyond their reach, however, after 54 minutes, when former England defender Le Saux scored Chelsea's third goal to send his team soaring towards the semi-finals.

Tim Sherwood lost possession on the edge of the box to Le Saux, who calmly drilled the ball past Sullivan.

Hoddle made his last throw of the dice after 61 minutes, replacing Dean Richards with Sergei Rebrov.

The loss of Richards left Spurs exposed at the back and Gudjohnsen punished them with the fourth breakaway goal after 65 minutes.

Spurs lost possession on the halfway line and Gudjohnsen raced clear before again slotting the ball past Sullivan.

Hoddle withdrew the tired Darren Anderton after 74 minutes and replaced him with Taricco, and the Argentinian defender was to have a dramatic effect on the game two minutes later.

He was wildly fouled by Le Saux, who was shown a second yellow and then a red card.

Frank Lampard was lucky to escape with a yellow card two minutes into injury time for an over-the-top tackle on Taricco, and seconds later the final whistle signalled the start of Chelsea's celebrations and chants of "easy" from the away end. -PA