Ayr United's Scottish Cup crusade came to a heart breaking end at Falkirk Stadium tonight - with a late collapse to John McGlynn's Bairns.
Dipo Akinyemi fired home the opener after 12 minutes, but Callumn Morrison levelled matters from the spot in the second half.
A Chris Maguire penalty that could've put Ayr ahead again with 10 minutes to go agonisingly crashed off the woodwork.
And the Bairns made them pay - when Kai Kennedy came off the bench to make it 2-1 after 83 minutes - with a deflected shot that came off Frankie Musonda.
Boss Bullen made one change to his starting 11, Aidan McAdams, the ‘cup keeper,’ replacing Charlie Albinson between the sticks.
After a minute played Reece McAlear sent a header wide from the edge of the box after getting on the end of Akinyemi’s cross from the right.
United made all the early inroads, forcing a couple of corners, but the Bairns defence held firm.
At the other end Morrison scampered down the left before delivering an inviting cross for Max Kucheriavyi, but his first time effort took the ball wide.
Then Blaine Rowe’s cross deflected to the edge of the box where Kucheriavyi unleashed a low drive, but the Ukrainian’s low effort was blocked.
Stephen McGinn latched onto the rebound, but the midfielder’s effort came to nothing.
Ayr, though, made the breakthrough after 12 minutes.
Akinyemi picked up Sam Ashford’s knockdown before wriggling free of the Falkirk defence and firing a low drive into the bottom right hand corner from 20 yards.
Before Falkirk had time to recover, that man Akinyemi forced keeper Kinnear to scramble to his right to claw away his distance effort after the in-form striker collected McAlear’s ball forward.
The chances continued and Maguire and Ashford combined before the latter flashed a shot across the face of goal, but Akinyemi just failed connect.
Akinyemi fluffed his lines moments later when he was clean through and somehow contrived to miscue his effort - but the nearside flag was raised anyway.
Towards the half hour, midfielder Mark McKenzie tried his luck from distance that flew harmlessly wide before Ashford went to ground under Rowe’s challenge- but Maguire’s free-kick deflected behind for a corner.
Coll Donaldson saw a couple of headed efforts worry the United defence but he was unable pierce the net with either of them.
Falkirk stepped up the pressure after the break and began posing real questions to United defensively.
The Bairns won a spot kick in the 66th minute when Musonda was adjudged to have handled in the box.
Up stepped Morrison to fire low and into the bottom left hand corner for 1-1.
Kinnear denied Akinyemi with two great saves in quick succession as United sought to regain the initiative.
But second half sub Kennedy was the man to win this quarter-final tie, sending a deflected effort off Musonda and into the left hand corner to send the home fans into raptures.
Late on Morrison forced a brilliant save from McAdams as Falkirk threatened to finish with a flourish.
Ayr miss out on semi-final spot at Hampden against Inverness with Celtic v Rangers making up the other half of the draw.
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