The draw for the fourth round of the Carling Cup has been made, and Liverpool have been drawn against striker Robbie Keane’s former club Spurs.
It’s an away draw, and the trip to White Hart Lane will take place week commencing November 10th, sandwiched between league games against West Brom and Bolton.
It’ll be the seventh time the two sides have met in the competition, Liverpool having only won two of those games. The first meeting was in 1972, in the fifth round, a 1-1 draw at Anfield preceding a 3-1 win for Spurs two days later back in the days when replays still took place. Liverpool reversed that scoreline almost ten years later in the next meeting, and it was at Wembley in the final. That was the second of four successive League Cups for Bob Paisley. Spurs knocked the Reds out in the third round in 1984, 1-0 at White Hart Lane, and again in 1998 with another 3-1 scoreline.
The most recent meeting was something of a dramatic night. Spurs broke the deadlock 18 minutes into extra time in London, only for Florent Sinama Pongolle to level the game from the spot with 3 minutes left. That meant penalties were needed to decide it, and after successful kicks from Henchoz, Partridge and Welsh it was down to Pongolle to put Liverpool through. He kicked the opposite way to the kick he’d taken during the game itself, and Liverpool were through. The Reds went all the way to the final after that, but were beaten at the Millennium Stadium by Jose Mourinho’s Chelsea – and that result was soon forgotten after Liverpool sent Chelsea out of the Champions League on their way to Istanbul.
Full draw:
Sunderland v Blackburn
Arsenal v Wigan
Chelsea v Burnley
Swansea v Watford
Manchester United v Queens Park Rangers
Stoke v Rotherham
Brighton or Derby v Leeds
Tottenham Hotspur v Liverpool