The key to predicting the FA Cup results will be the attitude of the big guns - will they roll out their best players?
The FA Cup's reputation as a great leveller is on the decline but, while upsets are few and far between, handicap backers should be wary of expecting runaway wins for the big teams in this weekend's fourth round. In the third round, only four of the 10 Premiership teams drawn against lower-league opposition managed to win by two clear goals at the first time of asking (three of the five all-Premiership games were won by the same margin).
The magic of the FA Cup is captured in two of the weekend's live TV games - Chelsea at non-league Scarborough tonight and Manchester United's trip to Northampton Town tomorrow. On paper, there is nothing to worry the big boys - not even the possible presence of Vieira in the Northampton lineup against United (this Vieira is the Brazilian striker Magno Silvo Vieira, on loan from Wigan).
Both have been given a two-goal start on the handicap, but the biggest question for punters concerns the teams United and Chelsea are going to put out. United's attitude is hard to assess as they rarely meet such low-level opposition as Northampton - 82 places below the Premiership champions in the league structure. Chelsea's is more evident from their record - over the past six seasons, they have played away in the FA Cup to five sides from Division Two or below and won all five by at least two goals.
United and Chelsea should both win, of course, but their ability to cover the handicap might be hampered by the modern tendency to rest or substitute the best players once a result is assured. A draw on the handicap looks a good bet in both cases.
It was noted before the third round that Premiership teams tend to be knocked out by other Premiership sides - in the past three seasons, the totals of Premiership sides knocked out by lower-division opposition in the whole of the FA Cup campaign have been seven, seven and five (essentially from 19 possibles, given the high probability of a Premiership winner in the final, and roughly at a rate of two per round, in rounds three, four and five).
