Category: FA Cup

VAR is back (to save us all), Plymouth are plotting another upset and Cardiff’s Anwar El Ghazi returns to Villa Park

The trip to Aston Villa looks tricky for Cardiff City, whose main focus is avoiding relegation to League One. Anwar El Ghazi, at least, was delighted with the draw. The Dutchman spent four years at Villa, clinching promotion at Wembley at the end of a loan season in 2018-19 before a permanent move from Lille. El Ghazi scored Villa’s first goal in a playoff final victory over Derby, with John McGinn and Tyrone Mings the only survivors from that team. Both clubs’ futures hinged on that game under the arch: Derby spiralled and faced administration before dropping into the third tier. El Ghazi can count on a hero’s welcome at Villa Park on Friday. Villa, who will visit Club Brugge for a Champions League last 16 first-leg tie on Tuesday, hope to advance to the FA Cup quarter-finals for the first time since ending as runners-up to Arsenal 10 years ago. Ben Fisher

Aston Villa v Cardiff, Friday 8pm (all times GMT)

Crystal Palace v Millwall, Saturday 12.15pm

Bournemouth v Wolves, Saturday 3pm

Manchester City v Plymouth, Saturday 5.45pm

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Plymouth will be hoping for another slice of luck in the FA Cup when they face Manchester City on Saturday

By That 1980s Sports Blog

There is nothing wrong with a fluke in sport. Cliff Thorburn will forever have a place in Crucible history, having achieved the first 147 at the venue in the World Championship. But how many people will recall that the first of his 36 balls was a fluke? From good luck to “good luck, mate” in a little over 15 minutes of pure theatre.

Football is no different. There are numerous examples of fortune playing a key role in memorable matches: Jimmy Greenhoff’s winner in the 1977 FA Cup final that denied Liverpool the chance of a treble; Darren Bent’s beach ball goal; Tommy Boyd in France 98; Bruno Bellone’s penalty at Mexico 86.

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Goals from Daniel Muñoz and Justin Devenny earned Crystal Palace a 2-0 win at Doncaster and a last-16 tie at home to Millwall

1 min: The Palace fans have travelled up the M1 and M18 in numbers. It looks freezing cold. Doncaster engage the old high press and forced Matt Turner to lose the ball.

Oliver Glasner’s turtle-neck jumper rather unfortunately reminds of the U-Boat captain in Dad’s Army. Don’t tell him, Pike.

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Lifelong Argyle fan Jed Griffiths was at Home Park for the victory over Liverpool in 1956 and Sunday’s FA Cup shock

As snapshots of a lifetime spent following Plymouth Argyle, two wins against Liverpool, almost 70 years apart, stand out for Jed Griffiths. Few among the Home Park faithful attended both but Griffiths, a proud member of the Green Army since 1953, was there for the 4-0 win on 11 February 1956 in the old Second Division, his beloved club’s previous defeat of Liverpool. As for the FA Cup fourth-round giantkilling on Sunday, when the Championship strugglers sank the Premier League leaders, it was “one of the highlights of my footballing life”.

In 1956, Griffiths was a schoolboy at Devonport High school, watching the game from the old “Pop Side” of the old Home Park. “No seats in those days,” he says. “We were opposite the grandstand, and we younger kids would get passed down the front, and we hung on the railings for a closeup view.”

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Plymouth showed the world’s oldest football competition still has life but Arne Slot won’t be too worried despite his team winning just five of their last 11 games

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It was, it has to be acknowledged, a much-changed Liverpool lineup. Of the 11 players who began Sunday’s FA Cup fourth-round match at Plymouth Argyle, only Luis Díaz had made more than 10 league starts this season and only three others had made more than five. Even allowing for that, Plymouth’s victory registers as one of the great shocks of recent times, only the fourth time the leader of the Premier League has ever gone out of the competition to lower-division opposition.

As their quietly charismatic 42-year-old Bosnian coach Miron Muslić pointed out afterward, it was a day that will go down in Plymouth’s history, that will be recalled for generations, as a one-off result more impressive than anything they achieved in reaching the semi-final in 1983-84. It was Liverpool’s ninth defeat to lower-league opposition this century but, in terms of the scale of the shock, it felt perhaps most akin to their exit against non-league Worcester City in 1959 when they were a second-flight club, a defeat that precipitated the decline that led to Phil Taylor making way for the great Bill Shankly.

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While ecstatic Plymouth Argyle fans almost certainly cared not one whit that they couldn’t recognise some of the faces in the Liverpool side their basement-dwelling Championship side knocked out of the FA Cup on Sunday, there were no end of media buzz-kills on hand to talk down their achievement. The fact that Arne Slot had spared almost all of his big-name heavy artillery the long trip to Devon was immediately raised, although we can only guess if the presence of Alisson, Mo Salah, Cody Gakpo, Virgil van Dijk, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Ryan Gravenberch, Dominik Szoboszlai, Alexis Mac Allister and Ibrahima Konaté in their side might have led to a more impressive Liverpool performance. You can only beat what’s in front of you and while it’s true that Liverpool’s line-up certainly had an early pre-season friendly feel about it, the atmosphere at Home Park did not and could only have been more febrile if a visiting Scouser had been caught putting jam on their half-time scone before the clotted cream.

How KCTV gets the footage is a mystery … there is no studio. It’s straight into the game, which carries Korean commentary from KCTV over the crowd noise. Most homes appear to have TV these days and KCTV is the most widely received national network, so most homes are able to watch” – a report by US website 38 North reveals that a heavily censored version of the Premier League is now being beamed into North Korea though we doubt Richard Masters will be paying the country a visit to discuss any possible copyright breach.

Perhaps Big Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s inspiration can come from the owners of Football Manager and officially bin MU25 for similar ‘delays and technical hitches’ (Friday’s Football Daily, full email edition), although I doubt a refund would create a ‘huge disappointment’ among its fanbase. Aiming for a MU26 launch date of around November sounds about right as well” – Ian Potter.

Rich Goldthorpe’s twin-fandom combination of Manchester United and St Albans City tore at my heartstrings (Football Daily letters passim), but sadly I can go one better (worse). United, my team since childhood more than 50 years ago, and St Albans City – now my home – are accompanied by my original home team, Grantham Town. The Gingerbreads are currently hurtling out of the Northern Premier League Midlands division in the wrong direction for a second successive relegation. Fourteen points from 28 games with only Walsall Wood below them and that’s because Walsall have no points at all after folding earlier this year. I don’t even know what division lies below the NPLM. This has been a year to look away from the results and hope for better things next year. Still, once you’ve got your team(s) you’ve got them for good … or in this case bad” – David Fryer.

If Arne Slot wanted an option on the bench, he should have picked Djimi Traoré. He could always pull out an unforgettable goal playing against lower league opposition, that lad. What? Well, John Aldridge then, surely to be relied on to put it away in a clutch FA cup situation. Yes, I’m still so bitter” – Jon Millard

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A much-travelled former FA Cup hero for Cambridge against Newcastle now has Crystal Palace in his sights

Subscribers to the theory that the FA Cup has lost its magic have clearly never met Joe Ironside. It is now more than three years since the Doncaster striker experienced one of the very best days of his life when he scored the winning goal for his former team Cambridge United in a wildly celebrated third-round upset at Newcastle.

“What a day, what a really special day,” says Ironside as he looks forward to Crystal Palace’s visit to South Yorkshire for Monday night’s fourth-round tie. “The celebrations afterwards are something I’m going to remember for a lifetime but, although my memories are all happy, the game itself is a bit of a blur. The one thing I can remember was the VAR check for offside after I’d scored. It was only about three minutes but it felt so long.”

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George Hirst finds inspiration from his father, Plymouth exploit Arne Slot’s choices and Marcus Rashford shows promise at his new club

Against Tottenham, the Aston Villa substitute Marcus Rashford looked, well, like the old Marcus Rashford. On the left, the Manchester United loanee embarrassed Pedro Porro with a nutmeg. Through the middle, a deft touch helped release Jacob Ramsey through on goal. Rashford flew down the right at searing pace (before a brilliant Archie Gray tackle limited further damage to Spurs). In half an hour, Rashford only had one fewer touches than Son Heung-min managed in 90 minutes. He looked fit and mentally eager (winning both the tackles he attempted), had a 93% pass accuracy, won four of six aerial duels and generally looked in synergy with his new teammates. Maybe he has a point to prove, or has had a boost of confidence from Villa’s fans and manager, or maybe Rashford is just playing in a quality, well-oiled side again, but Villa’s new No 9 looked – for 30 minutes at least – back to his best. Michael Butler

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The brilliant Morgan Rogers made one and scored one as Villa deservedly beat Spurs in an enjoyable cup tie

Jacob Ramsey scores after 58 seconds!

1 min Spurs kick off from right to left as we watch.

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Two goals in two first-half minutes, the first from João Gomes and second from Matheus Cunha, gave Wolves a comfortable win

I’m looking forward to seeing how Amario Oswald Gerardo Cozier-Duberry get on today. The 19-year-old winger was highly regarded when at Arsenal and might just provide the unpredictability Blackburn have been missing.

It’s also worth noting that Blackburn give debuts to recent arrivals Yuri Ribeiro and Emmanuel Dennis. The latter, on loan from Nottingham Forest, could prove to be a really smart acquisition.

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Arriving with no pre-season, the Italian appeared ‘left behind’, but could now be unleashed for the gruelling run-in

Andy Robertson remembers vomiting the first time he ever did the lactate test. He was 23 years old, had just arrived from Hull and considered himself in pretty good shape. Until, that is, he was made to run Jürgen Klopp’s sadistic pre-season gauntlet for the first time.

Basically, you do laps of the training pitch. The required pace gradually quickens, in the manner of a bleep test. Unlike in a bleep test, however, at regular intervals a member of Klopp’s medical staff will come over, puncture your ear and – ew – extract a sample of blood from it. High lactate levels indicate fatigue; too high and you’re done. Pretty soon Robertson was feeling queasy. He started gagging. Full discharge followed soon after. It may not surprise you to know that James Milner won the Melwood lactate test eight years running.

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Joe Willock scored twice as Newcastle edged Birmingham in an extraordinarily eventful game

6 min Pope, who isn’t the best with his feet, sprays a pass straight out of play.

4 min Iwata’s pass is intercepted by Willock, who surges 50 yards down the left and curls a dangerous cross – or rather, what would have been a dangerous cross if there was a Newcastle player in the area.

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Goodison Park commemorated Everton’s history in the FA Cup before kick-off, the Park End awash with banners related to the club’s five triumphs in the competition. Bournemouth consigned Goodison’s FA Cup story to history. Cup ties have been played at this famous old stadium for 132 years. There will never be another.

Andoni Iraola’s tireless, intelligent team tormented Everton once again. After the dramatic comeback here in August and last month’s win at the Vitality Stadium, the final act for Sean Dyche, Bournemouth made it a hat-trick of victories over Everton this season to advance into the fifth round. The final FA Cup act for Goodison centred on two first-half mistakes from James Tarkowski, who conceded a penalty scored by the impressive Antoine Semenyo and lost possession for Daniel Jebbison’s strike. David Moyes’s side reacted strongly in the second half but hit a post three times and had another attempt cleared off the line.

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Orient gave City a major scare, taking the lead in amazing circumstances before Pep Guardiola’s side fought back

2 min It’s a grim afternoon in East London: wet, windy and more than a little brisk.

1 min Peep peep! Orient kick off from right to left as we watch.

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• Visiting fans criticised by clubs after fourth-round tie
• Burnley knock out Southampton with Edwards goal

Leeds United and Millwall have condemned “vile” tragedy chants from the visiting fans during the Lions’ FA Cup victory at Elland Road.

Femi Azeez scored twice to send Millwall into the fifth round for the first time in six years but the match was overshadowed by events in the away end. Lions supporters were criticised by both clubs for referencing the murders of Leeds fans Christopher Loftus and Kevin Speight in 2000 in Istanbul before a Uefa Cup semi-final against Galatasaray.

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