How do you get over this? – Andy Peaks urges Tamworth to refocus after Spurs tie

Tamworth boss Andy Peaks has backed his FA Cup heroes to quickly shift focus to the club’s bread and butter of National League football after a day to savour against Tottenham.

The part-time outfit were able to take Spurs to extra-time in an extraordinary effort at the Lamb Ground before they succumbed to a 3-0 loss on Sunday.

Eight-time FA Cup winners Tottenham were made to sweat throughout a pulsating third-round tie in front of the TV cameras, but Peaks’ men have little time to dwell on their achievements.

A Birmingham Senior Cup clash with Boldmere is up next on Tuesday before a critical fixture in Tamworth’s battle for league survival at home to second-bottom Boston on Saturday.

The 16th-placed Lambs currently hold a seven-point advantage over the National League relegation zone and Peaks knows his group will give everything to clinch safety as quickly as possible.

“I want to stay up but I want to do it as soon as we can to be honest,” Peaks reflected.

“After this, next Saturday will be a massive game because how do you get over this? Well, not over it but how do you replicate it because we have to.

“I believe I have a group of players that play like that whoever they are playing, whether it is a Sunday morning team or an international team because that is the only way we can play.

“Blood, thrust, organised, working hard, set-pieces, spirit and that is us in a nut shell.”

Tamworth navigated ties with Macclesfield, Huddersfield and Burton to set up the clash with Spurs, which almost produced one of the FA Cup’s greatest shocks after Thomas McGlinchey and Jordan Cullinane-Liburd squandered stoppage-time chances.

Despite an eventual loss after 120 minutes, Peaks was delighted with the run and felt his squad were able to take in the occasion with plenty of shirts swapped with Spurs players at full-time.

Peaks added: “I said ‘don’t let it pass you by’, because things can pass you by and you can get so excited by a game that it goes past and you think what happened?

“I think they took it in really well and they played their part. I think they have got so many good memories, they’ve got shirts and whatever else. That’s how it should be.

“It’s what the FA Cup is all about. That’s what you do it for, that is why when years ago when I was at (non-league) step five or six you go into the lower rounds because it’s all about upsets and shocks.

“This is what it can come to. Us playing Tottenham at home. Who would have thought that? With this many people, on the TV, all the internationals and that for me is the FA Cup and what I’ll take out of it.”

Spurs midfielder Archie Gray, who again battled well out of position at centre-back, refused to make excuses for the team’s below-par display against a club 96 places below them in the English football pyramid.

Ange Postecoglou picked a strong line-up, but had to introduce Dejan Kulusevski, Son Heung-min and Dominic Solanke to help Tottenham progress into round four.

“For the 90 minutes, credit to them they withstood it. In extra-time I thought our quality shone through and we managed to get the result,” Gray told SpursPlay.

“They made it really difficult for us. Not to make excuses or anything, but it’s a bit of a change for us, a different pitch and that can affect it but ultimately we weren’t good enough. We should have shown our quality more.”