The 1996–97 Football League Cup (known as the

Coca-Cola Coca-Cola, or Coke, is a cola soft drink manufactured by the Coca-Cola Company. In 2013, Coke products were sold in over 200 countries and territories worldwide, with consumers drinking more than 1.8 billion company beverage servings ...

Cup for sponsorship reasons) was the 37th

Football League Cup The English Football League Cup, often referred to as the League Cup and currently known as the Carabao Cup for sponsorship reasons, is an annual Single-elimination tournament, knockout competition in men's domestic football in England. Orga ...

, a knockout competition for England's top 92

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

clubs. The tournament was won by

Leicester City Leicester ( ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city, Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area, and the county town of Leicestershire in the East Midlands of England. It is the largest city in the East Midlands with a popula ...

, who beat

Middlesbrough Middlesbrough ( ), colloquially known as Boro, is a port town in the Borough of Middlesbrough, North Yorkshire, England. Lying to the south of the River Tees, Middlesbrough forms part of the Teesside Built up area, built-up area and the Tees Va ...

1–0 in the

final Final, Finals or The Final may refer to: *Final examination or finals, a test given at the end of a course of study or training *Final (competition), the last or championship round of a sporting competition, match, game, or other contest which d ...

replay at Hillsborough after finishing 1–1 at

Wembley Stadium Wembley Stadium, currently branded as Wembley Stadium connected by EE Limited, EE for sponsorship reasons, is an association football stadium in Wembley, London. It opened in 2007 on the site of the Wembley Stadium (1923), original Wembley Sta ...

First round

66 of the

First First most commonly refers to: * First, the ordinal form of the number 1 First or 1st may also refer to: Acronyms * Faint Images of the Radio Sky at Twenty-Centimeters, an astronomical survey carried out by the Very Large Array * Far Infrared a ...

Second The second (symbol: s) is a unit of time derived from the division of the day first into 24 hours, then to 60 minutes, and finally to 60 seconds each (24 × 60 × 60 = 86400). The current and formal definition in the International System of U ...

and Third Division clubs competed from the first round. Each section was divided equally into a pot of seeded clubs and a pot of unseeded clubs. Clubs' rankings depended upon their finishing position in the 1995–96 season.

First leg

Second leg

Second round

The 33 winners from the first round joined the 15

Premier League The Premier League is a professional association football league in England and the highest level of the English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Football Lea ...

clubs not participating in European competition plus the 3 non-promoted play-off teams from the First Division and the 3 relegated clubs from the

in the 1995–96 season in round two. First leg matches were played on the 17 and 18 September, second leg matches were played on 24 and 25 September.

First leg

Second leg

Third round

The 27 winners from the second round joined the five Premiership clubs participating in European competition in round three. Matches were played on 22 and 23 October.

Ties

Replays

Fourth round

Most matches were played on 26 November 27 November with two replays being played on 18 December.

Replays

Quarter-finals

The four matches were played between 8 and 29 January.

Replay

Semi-finals

The semi-final draw was made in January 1997 after the conclusion of the quarter finals. Unlike the other rounds, the semi-final ties were played over two legs, with each team playing one leg at home. The first leg matches were played on 18 and 26 February 1997, the second leg matches were played on 11 and 12 March 1997. Leicester City went through on away goals to reach their first cup final in 28 years at the expense of Wimbledon, while Division Two underdogs

Stockport Stockport is a town in Greater Manchester, England, south-east of Manchester, south-west of Ashton-under-Lyne and north of Macclesfield. The River Goyt, Rivers Goyt and River Tame, Greater Manchester, Tame merge to create the River Mersey he ...

gave Middlesbrough a run for their money, going out by a single goal.

First leg

Second leg

''Leicester City win on away goals'' ''Middlesbrough win 2–1 on aggregate''

Final

The 1997 Coca-Cola Cup Final was played on 6 April 1997 and was contested between

and

. Leicester won 1–0 in the replay at Hillsborough on 16 April 1997. This was the last year that the Football League Cup Final was decided by a replay.

Replay

References

External links

Official Carling Cup websiteCarling Cup
at bbc.co.uk
League Cup news, match reports and pictures
on Reuters.co.uk
Results on Soccerbase
{{DEFAULTSORT:1996-97 Football League Cup EFL Cup seasons League Cup

Cup A cup is an open-top vessel (container) used to hold liquids for drinking, typically with a flattened hemispherical shape, and often with a capacity of about . Cups may be made of pottery (including porcelain), glass, metal, wood, stone, pol ...