Tottenham Hotspur will face London rivals Chelsea in the semi-final of the FA Youth Cup after a crazy 5-3 victory over Newcastle United at St James’ Park.

Four goals in the final seven minutes made for a dramatic conclusion to a game that Spurs had taken a firm grip of early on.

Keanen Bennetts and Reo Griffiths both scored inside seven minutes of the start and although Lewis McNall’s penalty pulled one back for the hosts early in the second half, Kazaiah Sterling restored the two-goal advantage with just 26 minutes to go.

But then all hell broke loose. McNall lashed home from a corner on 83 minutes only to see Japhat Tanganga scored three minutes later with a tap-in after Jon Dinzeyi’s effort had been saved.

Owen Gallacher roused the almost 3,000 crowd once more just a minute later, meeting a cross from the right, and they almost grabbed an equaliser with Brandon Austin pushing McNall’s header round the post.

It left Dylan Duncan to finally put the game beyond Newcastle in the first minute of added time.

It books a repeat of the two-legged semi-final from two years ago which Chelsea won 5-4 on aggregate after Tottenham had taken a 2-0 first-leg lead.

John McDermott, head of player development, told the club’s website: “It’s one of those games where because it was so topsy-turvy I probably need to watch it again to get real context but I thought there was a lot more good than bad tonight.

“We played really well at times, created lots of chances, lacked cutting edge in certain periods but at critical times we did really well to restore the two-goal lead.

“We left ourselves a little bit exposed at times but we had the mental strength to bounce back and that’s really pleasing.

“In an ideal world we wouldn’t have had that rollercoaster, but that’s youth football.”

Spurs: Austin, Eyoma, Tsaroulla, Marsh, Dinzeyi, Tanganga, Shashoua, Skipp, Griffiths (Duncan 73), Oakley-Boothe, Bennetts (Sterling 29)

Subs (not used): Hinds, Roles, Whiteman

Goals: Bennetts 3, Griffiths 7, Sterling 64, Tanganga 86, Duncan 90+1.

Newcastle: Harker, Kitchen, Aplin, Longstaff, Bailey, Gibson, Gallacher, Goodridge (Heaney 77), McNall, Allan (Smith 68), Wilson

Subs (not used): Cass, Watts, Huuhtanen

Goals: McNall (pen) 50, 83, Gallacher 87

HT: Newcastle United 0 Tottenham Hotspur 2

Referee: David Webb

Attendance: 2,847