Manchester City kicks Chelsea, Arsenal and Tottenham out of the knockout competitions

The UEFA Cup third round matches provided plenty of surprises on Wednesday as Chelsea, Arsenal and Tottenham Hotspur were eliminated from the tournament.

Liverpool also qualified for the next round after beating Derby County on penalties after the match ended 0-0 after regulation and extra time.

Manchester City secured a comfortable 2-0 win over Graham Potter’s side at the Etihad Stadium thanks to goals from Riyad Mahrez and Julian Alvarez as they watched key stars such as Erling Haaland and Kevin De Bruyne from the bench.

Arsenal suffered a surprise defeat against Brighton and Hove Albion at the Emirates Stadium. Eddie Nkeitia gave Arsenal the lead in the 20th minute before former Arsenal striker Danny Welbeck equalized for the visitors with a penalty seven minutes later.

Kaoru Mituma gave Seagulls the lead in the 58th minute before Tariq Lamptey secured the victory for Brighton in the 71st minute to eliminate Mikel Arteta’s side from the competition.

The next big surprise of the night saw Tottenham Hotspur eliminated from the UEFA Cup by Nottingham Forest. Antonio Conte’s men were looking to recover from their Premier League loss to Liverpool at the weekend and named a fairly strong squad in the competition.

Despite having the lion’s share of possession tonight, Spurs failed to create any clear chances and only hit twice on target compared to Nottingham’s eight.

The hosts took the lead over Conte’s men in the 50th minute through Renan Lodi, and Jesse Lingard scored the second goal after seven minutes with a superb header past Fraser Forster.

Uriel Mangala’s red card in the 75th minute made things interesting, but Forrest held out until the end to knock Spurs out of the competition.

Newcastle United and Wolverhampton also qualified for the next round of the competition, while West Ham United were the fourth London-based team to be eliminated from the EFL Cup after losing on penalties to Blackburn Rovers.