NEWPORT DREAMING AS UNITED LIE IN WAIT
BEFORE we get down to the cold, hard cash we should savour a little of the FA Cup magic as served last night in a bitterly cold corner of Hampshire beside the M27 where Newport County prevailed against Eastleigh.
The reward for beating opponents from the National League at the second attempt is the plum draw of this season’s fourth round, at home against Manchester United, served up live on BBC One for an armchair audience on Sunday week.
It promises to be an emotional day for Newport manager Graham Coughlan. Raised as a United fan in Dublin, Coughlan would often travel across the Irish Sea to games at Old Trafford.
When Louis van Gaal’s United won the FA Cup against Crystal Palace in 2016, he was in the United end with his children to celebrate Jesse Lingard’s winner.
Next Sunday, he will be trying to pile more misery on Erik ten Hag amid the humble confines of Rodney Parade. What an occasion it will be for him and his players, and the staff and fans of the club, currently 17th in League Two.
Drawing Manchester United in the Cup can be transformational. Exeter City were arguably saved from liquidation by a third-round tie at Old Trafford when they were a non-League club in 2005 and reeling after criminal ownership. They held United and took them to a replay. The windfall turned the club around and helped them to two promotions.
One year on and Burton Albion were another non-League propelled upwards by a replayed tie against United, which helped them pay for the Pirelli Stadium, climb into the EFL and up as high as the Championship.
Crawley Town were in non-League when they went to Old Trafford in 2011, performed well and came away frustrated to have lost 1-0, but went on to earn promotion and were playing in League One within two years.
So the money matters when you are down in the National League or the lower echelons of League Two, where Newport are dwelling. The prize for winning this tie is £105,000 and the reward for being selected for a live game in the fourth round is £110,000.
It could explain the mildly apprehensive pre-match mood on a night of sub-zero temperatures
Some were making the ambitious National League side favourites and home fans marvelled at the incongruity of all the media interest, a packed press box, fleets of outside broadcast trucks and the TV cameras on makeshift scaffolds in spare areas of the Silverlake Stadium.
The last time these teams met, they were both battling away in the National League South.
Newport came in like wily old stagers and took control with an early goal. Will Evans carried the ball into the penalty box and tumbled under a challenge by Ludwig Francillette. Aaron Wildig pounced as the ball spilled, skipped around goalkeeper Joe McDonnell and rolled his first goal since August into the open net.
The south Wales club have been through this before as established FA Cup giant-killers of recent years. They embarrassed Leicester, Leeds and Middlesbrough over the course of two seasons. They took Tottenham to a replay at Wembley and put up a spirited fight before leaking four against Manchester City in the fifth round at Rodney Parade in 2019.
Once ahead, they might have quickly scampered over the horizon. Seb Palmer-Houlden lashed one wide from an angle with his left foot and Scot Bennett saw a back-post header blocked on the line after a corner.
Eastleigh found a little rhythm and strung some passes together without troubling goalkeeper Nick Townsend at all in the first half but came under further pressure as they neared the interval.
Newport wanted a second. They had led 1-0 with eight minutes to play in the original tie, in which Eastleigh were reduced to 10 men in the first half but still found an equaliser with a late penalty converted by Chris Maguire.
Just two minutes into the second half and they were level as top scorer Paul McCallum seized on his first glimpse of goal and fired in his 26th of the season, a dipping shot from the edge of the box.
Home fans roared in triumph but parity was brief. James Clarke restored Newport’s lead on the hour with a powerful header from a corner just seconds after referee Sam Allison rejected enthusiastic appeals for a penalty for handball against Luke Croll.
McCallum turned a chance over on the turn at the near post before Evans struck to clinch the victory.