Comment: I’ve always been a passionate defender of the FA Cup – but even my patience is being tested like never before

And, despite everything that’s been thrown at it, despite every rule change and decision that’s stripped a little bit more magic away, sadly never to return, despite the FA’s miserable capitulation in the face of attacks from Klopp and Guardiola, it STILL is.

However, even my patience is being sorely tested, like never before, this season.

Scrapping replays from the first round proper onwards was bad enough; just because some Premier League managers believe the FA clogs up the fixture list, the likes of Weston-super-Mare were denied a replay against Bristol Rovers.

Now, though, we have the total and utter mess which is the third round programme. Once upon a time, all the third round fixtures, all 32 of them, took place at 3pm on a Saturday afternoon.

This season, only eight - a dismal quarter of the entire fixture list - kick off at that time. The other 24 are spread over a five-day period with 13 - THIRTEEN! - different kick off times.

The curtain was lifted on the third round at 7pm last night, with barely 6,000 at Bramall Lane to watch Sheffield United v Cardiff - the small matter of 23,000 down on the club’s last home Championship match. The tie, screened live on BBC Wales, was obviously a nuisance to Blades boss Chris Wilder, who made seven changes from the starting XI at Watford last weekend. If the manager can’t be too bothered about the FA Cup, then who can blame the fans for staying away?

Kicking off 45 minutes later last night was Everton v Peterborough. Posh were furious when the date was announced, as the date and kick off time made it difficult for younger fans to travel to Goodison Park, and who could blame them? But hey, who cares about the next generation and a once in a lifetime chance to visit one of England’s most historic stadia before the demolition crews move in?

Tonight brings two more ties. ITV officials haven’t got a romantic bone in their bodies, as they’ve inexplicably chosen a below full strength Aston Villa versus a below full strength West Ham for live coverage, while even more strangely Wycombe v Pompey is a 7.45pm kick off due to being shown live on overseas TV. A penny for the thoughts of whoever made that decision.

After numerous different kick off times tomorrow and Sunday - my favourite being Mansfield v Wigan at 6pm - the third round programme finally concludes with Millwall’s home tie with Dagenham & Redbridge at 7.30pm on Monday, live on ITV4.

I could weep, I really could.

Compare that lot to the 1978-79 third round programme, from the season where my love affair with Pele’s beautiful game began.

For starters, Third Division Sheffield Wednesday taking eventual winners Arsenal to FIVE games, the last three of which took place at Leicester’s Filbert Street!

The Owls didn’t face the Gunners’ fringe and youth players, as a third tier club undoubtedly would today, but their first choice team. And it wasn’t as if Wednesday were a great side, they only finished 14th in Division 3 that season. But they still held Arsenal to four draws. That’s FA Cup romance for you.

(I recently saw some great footage on X from the first of those five games, at Hillsborough, where the tie was held up after home fans had pelted Arsenal keeper Pat Jennings with snowballs. You had to laugh. Those were, as people of my generation like to say, the days.)

That was the season when Southend, who averaged crowds of 6,610 in the third tier, somehow shoehorned a club record 31,000 into Roots Hall for a third round tie against Liverpool. And they managed a 0-0 draw on a completely snow-covered pitch.

Look it up on YouTube. Go on, it’s incredible - Southend holding the European champions on a totally white surface. I wonder what Jurgen Klopp would have said if you told him that’s what Liverpool footballers, legends like Kenny Dalglish and Graeme Souness, once did. I’m not advocating we go back to playing on snow, but the contrast between what we had and what we have now is remarkable.

On a similar theme, imagine what Mikel Arteta would say if you told him his first team would fail to beat the team 14th in League One - currently Exeter (coincidentally the club I have supported since 1978) - in not only one FA Cup tie but FOUR of them, and that he’d have to play three replays at a neutral venue, all within an eight-day period, more than 100 miles away from London…

That was the season non-league Altrincham held Tottenham to a 1-1 third round draw at White Hart Lane. The replay, held at Manchester City’s Maine Road, attracted a crowd of almost 28,000. Unbelievable.

Imagine THAT today! And you’ll have to imagine it, because it will never happen again. And it will never happen again because, as already mentioned, the FA have scrapped replays, just to placate a handful of Premier League clubs - the same clubs who rarely field first team regulars in FA Cup third round ties anyway and who routinely clock up the air miles to play lucrative friendlies in faraway parts of the world.

Angry? Me? Too damn right I am.

In just over a decade of falling in love with football, I watched a Second Division club - West Ham - win the FA Cup; I watched Coventry City win the trophy for the first and only time, thanks to one of my favourite goals, Keith Houchen’s diving header; I watched Wimbledon - a non-league club 11 years earlier - beat the mighty Liverpool to lift the silverware, cue John Motson’s ‘the Crazy Gang have beaten the Culture Club.’

That was when the FA Cup meant something. To all fans, whether you followed Moneyfields or Manchester United, Portchester, Port Vale or Pompey.

Sadly, not any more, not really. I’m sure the majority of the Fratton faithful couldn’t care less if they lose to Wycombe tonight, so long as they stay in the Championship. And this from a fanbase who have actually seen their club lift the trophy in recent memory. But why can’t you have a decent cup run, perhaps a win at a below-strength Premier League club on the way, and still stay up? Why does it have to be one or the other?

Manchester United won the FA Cup last season, but no doubt many fans would have swapped it for a fourth-placed Premier League finish and Champions League football. But again, what’s wrong with finishing fourth AND winning the FA Cup?

What’s wrong with wanting your club to do well in the tournament that’s given so many wonderful memories? For many fans, myself included, the best memories they have ever had, and probably will ever have.

But despite the FA’s worst attempts, the competition is still alive, it still gives us Tamworth v Tottenham, Manchester City v Salford, Liverpool v Accrington and Leeds v Harrogate. For that, we should continue to cherish it. I know the 50-somethings, people like me, perhaps people like you dear reader, remember what it once was, the memories it gave us, even if it will never, can never, be the same again.