Key events
61 min: No penalty! VAR stick with the referee’s original decision. Seems fair enough but I doubt it would have been reserved had it been given in the first place. Relief for Arsenal.
60 min: Shouts for a Mansfield penalty! The ball breaks loose in the area and Abbott, the Spurs loanee, is pulled down by Salmon. It’s such a risk and VAR are checking …
59 min: Big opening for Mansfield! Reed has so much time on the edge of the box to decide whether to play in Akins or shoot himself. He chooses the latter and it’s a proper daisy-cutter and Kepa can throw his cap on it.
57 min: Will Evans, the former Cardiff Met University student, is no stranger to goals of that magnitude. He scored an equaliser for Newport against Manchester United in the FA Cup third round a couple of years ago.
55 min: Dowman shows his considerable class with some fast feet that evade Oshilaja on the edge of the box. His crafty low shot is then kept out by Roberts. Calafiori heads the resulting corner over the bar.
53 min: What a turn-up and a bit of a learning curve for Salmon. The 16-year-old was partly at fault for that goal but Evans was brilliant, driving past Mosquera and keeping his cool when it came to the finish. Mansfield’s chairman and chief executive married duo share a kiss in the stands. The romance of the Cup.
GOAL! Mansfield 1-1 Arsenal (Evans 50)
The sub turns super as he hauls Mansfield level! The roof comes off! Salmon sells Mosquera short in his own half, Will Evans runs on to the loose ball, sprints past Mosquera and finishes low past Kepa. What a moment! He’s only been on five minutes.
49 min: Mansfield bravely leave two up from Arsenal’s corner and it drags Martinelli back to halfway. Madueke and Dowman work it well and Madueke’s cross is cut out by Blake-Tracey.
48 min: After Oates tries to barge his way through the entire Arsenal backline, the visitors break at speed. Calafiori wins a corner, it comes to Dowman and his delightful digged-out cross is headed behind again.
Restart
We’re back under way and Mansfield have made a change – Will Evans is on for Tyler Roberts.
Have Mansfield got enough to get back into this? Arsenal’s departure from their just-go-out-and-play formation to a more rigid 4-3-3 has stifled the League One side a fair bit. Still, they looked like scoring in spells during the first half. Never say never.
England are playing Iceland (yes, yes) not far away from Mansfield – at the City Ground in Nottingham. It’s Women’s World Cup qualifying and it’s live here:
Here are the day’s other fixtures in the FA Cup. Well, there’s not many – and none at 3pm.
Tomorrow’s games:
Liverpool are already through to the quarters after beating Wolves last night. West Ham host Brentford on Monday night after the draw.
Half-time: Mansfield 0-1 Arsenal
Well, Mansfield have been nothing short of excellent and there is plenty of applause from their supporters at the whistle. Noni Madueke’s stunning goal, a touch of class on a difficult pitch, separates the two as they head down the tunnel.
45+2 min: Mansfield have the final chance of the half, McLaughlin swinging in a cross in for Akins to head over. Hincapié did just enough to put him off.
45 min: Dowman finds space to turn in midfield and feeds a ball towards Jesus but Oshilaja intercepts. He wants his goalkeeper to clean up but, after a few tetchy moments, gets the ball to safety himself.
Two minutes of added time.
43 min: Mansfield must stay in this until half-time. Madueke threatens again, inside the box this time, but skews his shot well wide at the near post. The Arsenal fans sing about Wembley.
GOAL! Mansfield 0-1 Arsenal (Madueke 41)
Relief for Mikel Arteta and Arsenal. Madueke’s initial shot is batted away by Roberts. Martinelli gathers the ball, lays it back to Madueke and he bends it, left-footed, into the far top corner from the edge of the box. Some finish.
40 min: Hincapié’s first involvement is to give the ball away and struggle to stay with Reed out wide. The substitute gives away a corner, which does some bobbling along the floor until Madueke scoops clear.
38 min: Trossard’s game is up. He’s picked up an injury and hobbles off. Piero Hincapié will replace him. Presumably Arteta will revert to a back four and that should be a compliment to Clough.
36 min: Howard writes in: “Botanic says he thinks that the ground staff have used a light roller on the pitch today and that it may turn later in the match.” Stand by for more Pitch Watch updates. It doesn’t seem to be affected Arsenal too much … but Trossard is down and looks in trouble.
34 min: Oates does incredibly well, prodding the ball past Calafiori and charging into the box. His ball across goal is held, to some relief I suspect, by Kepa. That was an opening.
32 min: Madueke shanks a shot high and wide with his weaker foot and tries to keep a straight face as the Mansfield fans let out a big cheer. Arsenal have, despite that, looked a bit more dangerous in the last few minutes.
30 min: Chance for Dowman! Trossard leaves Oshilaja behind and squares it for the teenager, whose shot is gathered by Roberts. He should score but, well, he’s 16 so we’ll let him off. He’s not scored for the first team yet.
28 min: Arsenal hit the post! Appeals for handball by the Arsenal fans after Blake-Tracey chests Madueke corner behind for a corner. No chance. Madueke curls his delivery into the near post and a combination of Roberts’ glove and the woodwork keeps it out.
26 min: Martinelli prods a shot straight at Roberts, who fumbles it out for a corner. The referee pulls it back for something, possibly an Arsenal foul on the edge of the box.
24 min: “You forgot ‘grappling’ in your list of evil tactics invented by Arsenal this season,” writes Patrick. Most of their players are still grappling with how they are supposed to line up. Dowman shoots over the bar.
22 min: Reed offers a hand to Havertz after bringing him down in midfield and the Arsenal man ignores him. The visitors are certainly not having it all their own way.
20 min: Arsenal try an intricate move in the Mansfield box with Madueke and Jesus. When Trossard tries to spin and shoot, Mansfield step in to clear. On the break, Oates tries to take on all of Arsenal’s three defenders and is eventually crowded out on the edge of Kepa’s area.
18 min: Another chance for Mansfield! McLaughlin gets forward down the left and swings a cross in from deep. Oates, admirably, takes it first-time on his left foot and the volley flies wide. Arsenal go direct again and Havertz can’t take down Kepa’s long ball. The roles are reversed at the moment in this cliched Cup tie.
16 min: A wayward pass from Trossard back to Mosquera gets a few ironic cheers. The Mansfield fans are really involved now. Kepa tries to go direct to Jesus but Oshilaja heads safely back to his goalkeeper, to more applause.
14 min: Roberts is next to have a go for Mansfield and his bending shot from distance drops just wide of the far post!
12 min: Arsenal fail to clear properly and Reed drives through the crowd from the edge of the box, Kepa getting down well to stop it. Oates tries his luck next and it’s deflected just wide. The corner causes carnage in the Arsenal box and it’s cleared against a Mansfield player and out for a goal-kick. Exciting!
11 min: We have VAR in action today. Roberts saves at point-blank range from Trossard before the assistant’s flag goes up against Jesus for a run earlier in the move.
Then Mansfield surge forward …
10 min: Blake-Tracey does well to intercept a ball through the middle looking for Jesus. Mansfield work it to Tyler Roberts and the former Leeds man tries to lob Kepa from the edge of the box, the emphasis being on the word ‘tries’. It’s not a bad effort though, the home crowd liked it.
8 min: The pitch is nice and bobbly in midfield but more playable out wide. Madueke and Dowman are doubling up on Arsenal’s right and you fear McLaughlin at left wing-back is going to be looking at the clock, a lot.
6 min: Dowman looks very dangerous, gliding past a couple of Mansfield players before winning a corner. Arsenal, strangely for them, take it short and Mosquera’s deflected shot flies over the bar. Trossard takes his time over the next corner, a nervous hush falls over the ground, and Mansfield eventually clear.
4 min: Big chance for Arsenal! They win it high up in the Mansfield half and Dowman is denied by Roberts’ legs.
2 min: McLaughlin runs down Madueke on the byline. Welcome to Mansfield, Noni. Tyler Roberts then does the same to Marli Salmon.
Kick-off
Mansfield get us under way!
Some pre-match thoughts from Charles Antaki via email: “Look, Arsenal fans don’t want much here – a relaxed, happy cup-tie day, with the club doing slightly patronising old-school honours to the home team, then a couple of early goals from elegant open play, another one early in the second half, perhaps allow the home team a screamer from the halfway line to regenerate interest, finish off 1-5. A sporting game throughout, handshakes and claps on the back at the end, and everyone goes home tired but happy. As I say, it’s not much to ask.”
Captains Louis Reed and Gabriel Jesus lead the teams out. Here we go.
Here’s how things are looking at the One Call stadium. Kick-off is minutes away.
Arsenal: They’re the team people love to hate at the moment. The reliance on set pieces, the time-wasting, the foul-buying – things you’d associate more with Cup underdogs than the Premier League leaders. They certainly got under Fabian Hürzeler’s skin in midweek.
But Mikel Arteta knows what he’s doing and his approach has been hugely successful so far this season. But how will the Mansfield fans react to any dark arts today? David Hytner has been asking exactly that:
There is something else at play, a narrative that picked up further steam as Arsenal won at Brighton on Wednesday. The club have a target on their back, partly because of their dominance in every competition thus far, partly because of how they have achieved it. Everyone seems to be firing at it.
Mansfield have not been as far as the fifth round for 51 years, when they were beaten by Carlisle. Their record FA Cup run was in 1969 when they reached the quarter-finals, losing to Leicester. The 3-0 defeat of Bobby Moore’s West Ham in the fifth round that year is Mansfield’s proudest moment.
Mansfield’s goal-filled FA Cup journey this season (so far):
First round: 3-2 v Harrogate (h)
Second round: 2-2 (3-1 pens) v Accrington (a)
Third round: 4-3 v Sheffield Utd (a)
Fourth round: 2-1 v Burnley (a)
“Arsenal are slightly technically better than us,” Clough smiles as he speaks to TNT Sports before kick-off. “We’ll try and play our normal game. When we can, we get the ball down and play. It’s difficult on a surface like this …”
The Field Mill pitch is looking patchy. We could do with some rain.
Mansfield: Manager Nigel Clough, of course the son of Brian (who never won this trophy), has been speaking to Peter Lansley this week about his dad, his ‘therapet’ dog Bobbie and taking on the Premier League leaders today:
We can watch Arsenal for their last 10 games. It would just frighten the life out of us. We’ll do some rudimentary work on corners. We know roughly how they’re going to come in, whatever their personnel. But if top Premier League teams can’t deal with them, I don’t know how a bottom-half League One side is meant to. I don’t want the players worrying unduly. There’s only one ball coming in at any one time. Deal with it.
Team news: Dowman starts for Arsenal
First things first, let’s bring you the starting lineups from Field Mill.
Mansfield (3-4-1-2): L Roberts; Knoyle, Oshilaja, Blake-Tracey; Akins, Abbott, Reed, McLaughlin; Russell; T Roberts, Oates.
Subs: H Lewis, Hewitt, Bowery, A Lewis, Moriah-Welsh, Hendry, Irow, Adeboyejo, Evans
Mikel Arteta has named as many as six forwards in his XI and I’m not sure we’re going to work out the formation until the game starts. I’ll try anyway:
Arsenal (4-3-3): Arrizabalaga; Salmon, Nørgaard, Mosquera, Calafiori; Dowman, Havertz, Trossard; Madueke, Jesus, Martinelli
Subs: Setford, Hincapié, Saka, Eze, Timber, Gyökeres, Dixon, Harriman-Annous, Ibrahim
There are first senior starts for 16-year-olds Marli Salmon and Max Dowman.
Preamble
Hello and welcome to Saturday’s early kick-off in the fifth round of the FA Cup – and what an intriguing tie it is. For Arsenal, the quadruple is on, even if the slightest mis-hap makes you feel like it’ll all fall apart. Could today be that day? Defeat at third-tier Mansfield would surely be the greatest FA Cup shock since, well, January.
Arsenal visit the One Call Stadium, AKA Field Mill, having already knocked out two lower-league teams this season in Portsmouth and Wigan. Let’s hope, for the neutrals (and my enthusiasm), Mansfield don’t concede four in the first half an hour like Wigan did in the last round. They say the pitch is a great leveller but with Arsenal’s aerial game, who knows, it could even work to their advantage.
Mansfield (16th in League One) don’t quite have the Cup pedigree of Portsmouth or Wigan. They are bidding to reach the quarters for the first time since 1969, when their manager Nigel Clough was tottering around as his dad managed Derby.
Kick-off is at 12.15pm (GMT). Feel free to get in touch with your favourite Cup memories, at Mansfield or otherwise, via email. This should be fun.
