How ex-Raith Rovers youth coach Craig Easton starred in seismic FA Cup shock

The date was January 8, 2006, the venue was Craven Cottage and the aforementioned former player was then Orient midfielder Craig Easton, whose man-of-the-match display won this FA Cup third-round encounter for Martin Ling’s visitors against Chris Coleman’s top flight big guns in front of a crowd of 13,394.

"That day was amazing,” Fife College lecturer Easton – a former Dundee United and Livingston player who after hanging up his boots was Raith Rovers youth coach and then Cowdenbeath assistant manager – said. “Apart from making my debut at Dundee United, it was the highlight of my career.

"Fulham were in the Premier League and we were in League Two. But we were doing well in our league so we were confident.

"We went to Craven Cottage and we just felt we could win if we treated it like any other game, it was a weird thing that I'd never experienced before. That Leyton Orient dressing room was probably one of the best I'd been in during my career.

"Beating Fulham was magnificent. My mum (Elizabeth), dad (Archie) and wife (Laura) were down for the game and Orient took about 6,000 fans along the river.

"For my goal, the ball bobbled about a bit at the edge of the box and broke to me. I saw a Fulham guy coming to shut me down so I just hit it and it went in.

"When you watch it on You Tube, the ball does take a slight deflection, but I’m saying it was going in anyway. I hit it quite nicely and I knew when it left my foot and was heading in the right direction that I’d probably scored.

"We played really well that day and I feel we deserved it, although Glyn Garner our goalkeeper did save a penalty (from Collins John). I think Fulham underestimated us. Their manager Coleman maybe jiggled things around a wee bit in terms of personnel, but they still had some top players.

"They didn’t think we were going to be as good as what we were.

"Our manager Martin and his assistant Dean Smith had been so calm in the build-up, they’d just told us to go and win like we’d been doing in the league because we were flying at the time.”

And this advice clearly worked, with Easton’s opener added to by Joe Keith who made it 2-0, before Fulham pulled one back in the second-half through John.

Easton added: "I’ll never forget how fantastic it was after that game going back on the tube with my parents, Laura and a few Os fans. It was brilliant, just an all round amazing day.

“We won through to play Charlton in the fourth-round, a game which unfortunately I was injured for. Although Charlton were Premier League as well, we nearly beat them too (Charlton won 2-1 with a 90th-minute winner by Jay Bothroyd).

"So it was a really good season and we went on to get promotion as well, so that season as a whole with Leyton Orient is probably one of the favourite times of my career.”