Was asked this by a Sheff Utd fan at work and I replied , without any hesitation, 3-1 to Everton. They'll take the lead early, we'll equalise , an upset will be on the cards and they will grab a couple at the end.
The sad thing is that this scenario sends everyone home happy. They just want the win - it's really all their season has left - whilst we will all be pleased with a plucky performance.
But you know what, sod it - I'm sick of plucky performances in these games. From Liverpool, to Sunderland, to Everton, to Charlton. to Arsenal back to QPR in the mid 90's - we seem to manage a plucky performance every time we come up against Premier League opposition. Everybody's happy, proud fans clap the players off with tears in their eyes and someone is straight onto the internet using the phrase " if we play like that in the next league game etc..." The thing is though that outside of our own club, nobody in the wider football community remembers the plucky side that fought hard and contemplated an upset. The Liverpool game grabbed a bit of attention but was largely forgotten 24 hours later. But if we'd won.....
Those of you at Anfield that night would have missed the radio commentary. In the midst of James Phillips spending most of the evening brown nosing Liverpool there was a classic exchange between him and Lummy, midway through the second half.
I paraphrase slightly but basically it went like this.
Phillips: " Whatever else happens tonight Carlisle have surely earned themselves a huge round of applause from the Liverpool fans after this game.
Lummy: "Who gives a shit about a round of applause. I want to win"
And that's kind of how I feel. We've done the near miss thing too many times , this is our moment to actually take the big team and actually cause the upset. Let's actually create the game that everybody remembers . For those of us that live and work outside Cumbria it seems our club is known for 3 things (4 now the pitch got flooded again) . Being top of the league 42 years ago, being a very long away from everywhere else and Jimmy Glass.
4th tier beating top tier, on live tv, would become football history and would bring our reputation bang up to date!
So to mis-quote Sir Lumsden again "[censored] the round of applause - let's just win it!"