FA Cup Preview: Can LVG Survive Derby Test, Will Hammers Bag Reds Hat-Trick?

It's been quite the week of denials. First Phil Collins chose the Times to refute an apocryphal tale of divorcing his wife via fax machine that predates man discovering fire, and then, in a fit of pique, Louis van Gaal rebutted suggestions he had offered to fall on his sword after Saturday's home defeat to Southampton.

A fifth loss in 10 matches that left Manchester United 10 points off Leicester City at the Premier League summit and five shy of Tottenham Hotspur in fourth had widely been reported to have left Van Gaal deflated to the point he had offered his resignation to Ed Woodward.

It was a decidedly more defiant Van Gaal who addressed the press on Thursday in the build-up to Friday night's FA Cup fourth-round tie at Championship side Derby County. If looks could kill, the back pages of Friday's newspapers would be blank.

Just another day in paradise for Louis.

The Iron Tulip bristled to the point it looked as though a fire extinguisher would have to be administered as he described treatment from the media with regard to his future as being "awful and horrible," per the Guardian:

"

You make your own stories and I am concerned that people believe what you write.

This is the third time I am sacked and I am still sitting here.

You write all these stories and then I have to answer questions about them. I am not doing that, it is awful and horrible.

"

With everyone present presumably a little sheepish, a swell of Manchester United supporters had Google scratching its metaphorical head by asking "is fourth time lucky a thing?" in unprecedented numbers.

Van Gaal was willing to concede that having overseen seven victories in 22 competitive matches, the Derby game has now become must-win, adding: "We cannot lose to a Championship club.

"Maybe then you will have written the truth [about him being sacked] because sometimes it happens."

Friday's trip to Derby pits one of the game's most experienced managers with one of its least. Paul Clement, by his own admission, is a novice in the job, having at 43 landed his first role as a No. 1 when taking the reins at Derby in the summer.

The healthiest of Championship budgets had seemingly been spent well as Derby sat in first place on Boxing Day, but since then, a run of five games without a win has seen them drop to fifth. As warm-up acts before the main event go, Monday's 4-1 defeat at Burnley was like sending Richard Pryor out to an audience of nuns.

Clement is no stranger to FA Cup glory, having twice won the competition when at Chelsea, assisting both Guus Hiddink and long-time mentor Carlo Ancelotti at Stamford Bridge. Working under the latter at both Paris Saint-Germain and Real Madrid should have provided him with an invaluable schooling in the art of working in a pressurised environment. Ancelotti came out of the womb taking a nap.

Anyone who has studied Ancelotti's methods at close quarters should have a fair barometer on what makes a good manager. Clement insisted the man who will sit in the opposite dugout on Friday at the iPro Stadium remains one of the best in the business, per the Guardian.

"

I’m not sure they got the wrong man

When you look at the big clubs—Barcelona, Bayern Munich, Real Madrid, Manchester United—there are very few people who can do those jobs, and [Van Gaal] is absolutely on that list.

They chose him, and he’s got the right to play in a way he feels is best. That’s part of the selection process. The man who followed Sir Alex [Ferguson] had his difficulties, and now the next man in has had some difficulties too, but coaches need time to develop what they want to do.

"

Michael Carrick's return from a knee injury could add a measured assurance to a United midfield indecisive and sluggish against Southampton. Van Gaal is likely to name an experienced lineup given he can ill afford to take lightly an out-of-sorts but talented Derby side. They have lost just one of their last 11 competitive home matches.

Captain Wayne Rooney has warned his team-mates to expect a battle, per the Telegraph: "The players who joined us last year and played against Cambridge [United] and Yeovil [Town] in the FA Cup will have seen that an FA Cup tie like this is more of a battle than a football game."

United's beleaguered boss could have his own section in the Guinness Book of Records, such has been his ill fortune at setting unwanted records this season. Perhaps now wouldn't be the best time to point out United haven't lost an FA Cup tie to Derby since February 1897, winning each of six ties between the two sides since. In their last 44 FA Cup games against lower-league opposition, United have lost just once, to Leeds United at home in 2010.

Time-honoured parallels have been drawn between Van Gaal's struggles and Sir Alex Ferguson's own winter of discontent in 1990. In particular an FA Cup tie on January 7 of that year that has kept Mark Robins in royalty cheques ever since.

In Ferguson's third full season in charge, with United labouring in 15th place in the league and on an eight-game winless run, the Scot took his side to the City Ground to face Brian Clough's in-form Nottingham Forest.

The previous month, on the back of a loss at home to Crystal Palace, a banner that read "three years of excuses" was unfurled in Old Trafford's old J Stand. It's not been seen since.

Robins' headed winner at Forest set United on their way to a first major honour under Ferguson, with the 37 trophies that followed testimony to the fact Woodward might be basing his patience on precedence as opposed to blind loyalty. He might also just be trying to save face with the Glazers, but that's all conjecture, horrible or otherwise.

The difference between 1990 and now is Ferguson was hungry to the point people would stop and offer him a chip in the street. Van Gaal, on the contrary, wears the haunted look of a rich, successful but stressed 64-year-old man pondering why he's not playing more golf.

If United lose on Friday, he may just have ample opportunity to improve his handicap.

Liverpool vs. West Ham, Saturday at 5.30 p.m. GMT

Clive Rose/Getty Images

It may be a competition forever synonymous with romance, but the FA Cup has long-since grown accustomed to accepting half-dead flowers plucked from a garage forecourt with the wearied resignation of a wife well aware there’s another woman.

Like an errant husband returning home still carrying the exotic scent of a secret lover, Premier League clubs all too often treat the world’s oldest cup competition as something to be endured rather than enjoyed.

Just when did the FA Cup become a weekend away at the in-laws, a ritual to be negotiated with studied politeness rather than genuine excitement?

Slaven Bilic is more than happy to swim against the tide. West Ham United's gregarious manager speaks of the FA Cup in such glowing terms he seems almost antiquated. In the build-up to his side's win over Wolverhampton Wanderers in the third round, per the Daily Mail, he even went as far as to suggest he'd rather win the thing than qualify for the Champions League.

With West Ham just six points shy of fourth and on a run of form that has seen them lose just once in their last 11 competitive matches, it will be interesting to see whether the side he selects at Anfield reflects such a statement of intent.

"I would like to win the cup. Of course," Bilic said. He continued:

"

Over the Champions League? Yes. It is a cup! Win the cup and I can hold it up. Get in the Champions League and I have to buy a magazine to show the league table and shout 'look where we are, look where we are.'

The proof is silverware. So I would prefer to win the FA Cup...and then finish fifth or sixth!

"

It is a wonder West Ham's training ground wasn't besieged by men in white coats, at least accountants, before he reached the end of his sentence. The rest of us stopped crying into our pillows for just a moment to embrace the smallest of victories over modern football and its all consuming worshipping at a cash altar.

Bilic takes his side to Merseyside more in expectation than hope having twice beaten Liverpool already this season. It was back in August when West Ham inflicted on Brendan Rodgers a first defeat of the season, a sorry 3-0 loss at Anfield that ultimately proved the start of the end for the then-Liverpool incumbent.

Jurgen Klopp fared barely better in January when Andy Carroll proved Liverpool's tormentor-in-chief at Upton Park, as West Ham bullied their way to a 2-0 victory. Whether the Hammers can complete a hat-trick of wins will likely hinge most heavily on whether Klopp elects to stick with the side that won through to the Capital One Cup final in midweek or makes wholesale changes to give youth its head as he did in the previous round against Exeter City.

With one eye on Tuesday's Premier League clash with Leicester City, the Liverpool Echo predicted Klopp will largely turn to those on the periphery of his first team, although it will not be as youthful a side as that which needed a replay to dispatch Exeter.

Daniel Sturridge, it seems, has yet to convince his manager he is ready for a recall.

Arsenal vs. Burnley, Saturday at 3 p.m. GMT

Sunday’s defeat at home to Chelsea, which saw Diego Costa score the game’s only goal, was more peak Arsenal than Charlie George lying flat on the Wembley turf with his arms outstretched after scoring the winner in the 1971 FA Cup final. It’s fair to say Saturday’s game against Burnley could prove to have restorative qualities or cataclysmic consequences.

The FA Cup may be a distant third on Arsenal’s lists of priorities, but should they lose to an in-form Burnley at the Emirates Stadium on Saturday, the whispers will return. Same old Arsenal—less bottle than an empty milk float.

Burnley travel to the capital in fine fettle having won five of their last six matches and on the back of a 4-1 defeat of Championship promotion rivals Derby County on Monday night at Turf Moor. It is not just home comforts that have catapulted Sean Dyche’s side up to third, either. Burnley have won their last three away games with a 10-2 aggregate scoreline, notable victories at Middlesbrough (1-2) and Brentford (1-3) sandwiching a 5-0 thumping of MK Dons. They certainly won’t be cowered at a trip south.

Few managers, if any, are as studious about the game as Arsene Wenger, and it will not be beyond his sphere of knowledge that should Arsenal win the FA Cup for a third season in a row, they will be the first side to do so in 130 years. Only two teams have ever previously achieved the feat, Wanderers (1878, 1879, 1890) and Blackburn Rovers (1884, 1885, 1886).

OLI SCARFF/Getty Images

History is certainly in Arsenal’s favour too. In their previous five FA Cup meetings with the Clarets, they have won them all, scoring 16 and conceding just once (in a 7-1 victory back in 1937) in the process.

With Tuesday's Premier League game against Southampton peeping over the horizon, it is thought Wenger will make significant changes. New signing Mohamed Elneny is expected to feature for the first time since arriving in north London from Basel earlier in January. 

The 23-year-old Egyptian, an intelligent reader of the game complete with iron lungs, impressed against Liverpool, Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur for Basel in the Europa League. If he can add a dynamism to the base of Arsenal's midfield that, for all his willing, seems beyond Mathieu Flamini these days, he could have a significant role to play between now and the season's conclusion.

First, though, he must show an appetite to quickly adapt to the demands of English football. Burnley's Joey Barton will likely ease him in gently. 

Wenger must also decide whether to give further minutes to Alexis Sanchez after the influential Chilean forward made his much-vaunted return from a troublesome hamstring injury in the second half against Chelsea.

If Olivier Giroud isn’t still pouting at being replaced during the tactical reshuffle in light of Per Mertesacker’s early dismissal, the Frenchman may also be given opportunity to improve on a record that has seen him plunder nine goals in his last 13 FA Cup appearances for Arsenal.

Colchester United vs. Tottenham Hotspur, Saturday at 12.45 p.m. GMT

"

The Independent understand Mauricio Pochettino is a 'strong' contender to become the next Chelsea manager. #THFC https://t.co/SSy29RW0bx

— Talking THFC (@TalkingTHFC) January 27, 2016"

Carlisle United vs. Everton, Sunday at 13.30 p.m. GMT

"

In more Carlisle-related fun, these are the showers Everton will use for their Cup game this weekend. Brrrrrrr. #Efc pic.twitter.com/ua6ZiKyB4f

— George Caulkin (@CaulkinTheTimes) January 25, 2016"

"

The manager also confirms @joelroblesb will start against @officialcufc on Sunday. https://t.co/h35XgzQjCF #CARvEFC

— Everton (@Everton) January 29, 2016"

MK Dons vs. Chelsea, Sunday at 4 p.m. GMT

"

What became of the Likely Lads? Well, @libertines predicted MK Dons 6-0 Chelsea https://t.co/0mWOT3SJnu #bbcfacup pic.twitter.com/JnCioHUEBY

— BBC Sport (@BBCSport) January 28, 2016"

"

NEWS: Alexandre Pato has passed his Chelsea medical and could make his debut v MK Dons on Sunday. [DailyStar] #CFC pic.twitter.com/ZQKx81MwoP

— ChelseaTalk (@TheBlues_Talk) January 28, 2016"