LAST night's FA Cup draw offered the mouth-watering prospect of a North-East derby in the semi-final of the world's most famous football competition.

Middlesbrough have been drawn against Newcastle - if the Magpies can overcome Arsenal in a replay in London on March 23. The semi-finals will be played on Sunday, April 14.

The two clubs have met twice before in the FA Cup - but not for more than 100 years. Middlesbrough won both encounters. It is only the second time in their 126-year history that Middlesbrough have reached this stage of the FA Cup.

Chelsea and Arsenal are now joint favourites to lift the Cup at odds of 2-1 with bookmakers William Hill.

The bookies offer Fulham at 9-2, Middlesbrough 11-2 and Newcastle at 7-1 while an all-London final is 10-11.

The dramatic draw, which created an all-London derby between Fulham and Chelsea in the other semi-final, was set up by Middlesbrough's easy 3-0 victory at the Riverside Stadium over Everton yesterday, and by Newcastle's 1-1 draw at St James' Park on Saturday evening.

That game left the BBC claiming victory, as its live coverage of the match netted a peak of 8.4 million viewers.

An average of 6.7 million viewers were watching throughout the game, compared with Cilla Black's Blind Date on ITV, which averaged six million viewers, and Stars in Their Eyes, which averaged 5.3 million.

The match attracted a higher audience than last season's FA Cup Final between Liverpool and Arsenal, which had a peak of 7.3 million and averaged 6.7 million, a BBC spokesman said.

It also beat the Worthington Cup Final two weeks ago on ITV with an average audience of five million and a 6.8 million peak.