Wimborne's Manager Said They Needed a 'Miracle' — A Property Surveyor Curled One Past Ex-Arsenal Keeper Vito Mannone, and the Seventh-Tier Club Reached the FA Cup Second Round for the First Time

Before Sunday's game, Wimborne Town manager Tim Sills said his side would need a "miracle" to beat Crawley Town in the FA Cup first round. It took a property surveyor nine minutes to give them one. Yang Seung-woo curled a shot into the top corner past Vito Mannone, the former Arsenal and Sunderland goalkeeper, and the seventh-tier Dorset club went on to win 2-0. That put them in the FA Cup second round for the first time in their history.

The Non-League Football Paper called it the biggest upset of the first round, and the gap explains why. Wimborne play in the Southern League Premier Division South, the seventh tier of English football. Crawley are a professional club in League Two, the fourth tier, and started the day 57 places above their hosts in the pyramid. Crawley are also bottom of League Two, which made this a bad day for them on top of a bad season.

The opener came from a Crawley mistake. According to reports in Korea, Mannone misjudged a throw, Yang picked up the loose ball on the right side of the penalty area and bent a right-footed shot into the top left corner. Mannone, who joined Crawley as a player-coach in June 2025, could only watch.

Yang is 24. He was born in South Korea in 2002, moved to England with his parents at the age of two and grew up in Bournemouth. He came through Southampton's youth academy, then played at Forest Green Rovers, Eastleigh, AFC Totton, Sholing and Bemerton Heath Harlequins before joining Wimborne in 2025. Like most of his teammates at a semi-professional club, he has a day job: he works as a property surveyor and valuer.

This goal also came after a long way back. Yang tore a posterior cruciate ligament in October 2025 in a game against Bath City, returned in April and re-signed with Wimborne before this season. He was named man of the match on Sunday.

"It was an incredible game for the club, the squad and the fans," he said in a club interview after the match.

Wimborne nearly had a penalty before the opener, when striker Cameron Munn went down in the box and the appeal was waved away. After Yang's goal, Crawley's Kai Jennings sent a low shot just wide and Jonny Russell headed straight at home goalkeeper Cam Plain. At the other end, Mannone saved when Joe Smith ran through on goal.

Crawley interim manager Kevin Blackwell made three changes at halftime, and Charlie Barker shot inches wide. The second goal, 11 minutes from time, had some luck in it: Jackson King's shot hit Munn and squirmed past Mannone.

It is the second straight season that Crawley have been knocked out of the FA Cup by a non-league club, after losing to Boreham Wood last year.

Wimborne's last appearance in the first round proper came in 1982-83, when they lost 4-0 at Aldershot. This time they won, and that is the furthest the club has ever gone in the competition.

Sills knows what these games mean. The former Stevenage, Aldershot and Torquay United striker scored for Camberley Town in a 1998 FA Cup qualifying-round win over St Blazey. Before the game he said the cup run had brought back his enjoyment of football.

Wimborne will now find out who they face in the second round. Whoever it is, it will be hard to top the story of the first: a property surveyor scoring past a goalkeeper who used to play for Arsenal.