Full report of the draw
Right, that’s it from me here. But join me over here to find out who’ll win the right to face [checks notes] Swansea City at the Liberty Stadium in round five.
So no doubt about the tie of the round – Chelsea v Manchester United – but I think that’s a pretty decent draw: several tricky away ties for Premier League teams and a couple of sides from outside the top flight certain to be in the last eight.
Brighton or West Brom v Derby County.
And that concludes the draw for the etc and so forth …
Portsmouth or QPR v Watford – another tough away draw for a Premier League side.
Swansea City v Barnet or Brentford – that’s the prize for the sides playing tonight.
Chelsea v Manchester United – OOF!
Middlesbrough or Newport v Manchester City
Doncaster v Crystal Palace – an awkward one for the Eagles.
AFC Wimbledon v Millwall – nice draw for both sides that.
First out of the hat: Bristol City v Shrewsbury or Wolves
OK, here we go. We’re outside with a variety of fans hanging around awkwardly and awaiting the draw. More naffness.
Keeping up the 90s Indie theme, we now have a feature with Skin from Skunk Anansie. Well, All I Want is the fifth-round draw. Amirite? Amirite folks?
Lauren Laverne is now chatting about the Kenickie days. I’m a fan of LL, she’s great, but this format just makes everyone involved look awkward and … naff. Naff is the word. It gets about 5m viewers a day though, which is extraordinary.
An email! “I have a simple, if not completely ridiculous and completely inconsequential, question,” begins Travis Giblin. “How does the FA decide which team gets which ball number? It doesn’t appear to be alphabetical or in the order in which the teams won their previous rounds game.”
Ah, ha! As with so many of life’s questions The Knowledge has the answer:
“There are two elements to how the ball numbers are determined,” an FA spokesman told us in 2003. “At the top end of the first round draw, the league teams are drawn in alphabetical order, from 1-48, with teams like Bristol City as the low numbers and York City at 48. Then, from 49 onwards, the clubs from the fourth qualifying round go into the draw as they come through, not in alphabetical order.
“When the draw was made on Monday for the quarter-finals, the teams were numbered in relation to how they had been drawn in the previous round. So, Arsenal were numbered one because - of those teams left in the draw - they came out first for the fifth round draw.”
As has become increasingly and depressingly traditional, the draw is in the middle of BBC One’s The One Show. Currently Lauren Laverne is being interviewed.
Preamble
Hello all and welcome to live coverage of the One Show featuring the FA Cup fifth-round draw. The balls will be emerging at around 7.20pm GMT, with Ian Wright and Alex Scott plucking the numbers out of the velvet bag.
Fifth-round draw numbers
1 Swansea City
2 AFC Wimbledon
3 Shrewsbury Town or Wolverhampton Wanderers
4 Millwall
5 Brighton & Hove Albion or West Bromwich Albion
6 Bristol City
7 Derby County
8 Doncaster Rovers
9 Chelsea
10 Watford
11 Middlesbrough or Newport County
12 Manchester City
13 Barnet or Brentford
14 Portsmouth or Queens Park Rangers
15 Manchester United
16 Crystal Palace
