It’s a fine-looking weekend chock full of FA Cup fourth-round goodies, and here at Big Weekend we’ve managed to resist the overwhelming temptation to just put Aston Villa v Spurs in every single category. Because all joking aside, it probably should be with the Rashford debut.
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!Game to watch: Birmingham v Newcastle
There are plenty of Intriguing Cup Ties in a fun-looking fourth-round draw and a case for all manner of them here.
The pick of the bunch is probably Villa-Spurs, let’s be honest, but that’s not getting Game to watch for reasons that will become clear shortly if they aren’t already. Brighton-Chelsea is not without its charms either. Blackburn v Wolves has a wonderfully old-school FA Cup feel to it, sounding like it ought not to be a fourth-round tie in 2025 but a final from the 1890s that ends 6-3 or something equally silly while also being played at The Oval.
But it’s Birmingham-Newcastle that gets the nod. This is really starting to feel like it could be the season Newcastle’s absurd wait for a proper major honour comes to an end. They will have one chance in the Carabao final against Liverpool at Wembley next month, but there seems little reason why they shouldn’t have another good crack at silverware in this one as well.
Birmingham away is a wonderfully ticklish draw too for the neutral. It’s textbook banana-skin territory if Newcastle are anywhere other than right on it, which is itself a tough ask after the midweek high against Arsenal.
Birmingham’s position atop League One is surely secure enough for them to give this a good go, and it always feels dangerous for a Premier League side travelling to a lower-division team that might be operating at a far lower level week to week but is extremely used to winning lots of matches.
Newcastle have been slightly patchy in recent weeks after an electric run of form over Christmas and the New Year, and they certainly used up some physical and mental energy in midweek.
They ought to still be too strong, of course, but can’t afford to take their eye off the ball in this one ahead of a crucial run of Barclays action over the rest of the month featuring Man City, Nottingham Forest and a Carabao dress-rehearsal against Liverpool.
Player to watch: Marcus Rashford
There is a compelling case to be made that Aston Villa v Spurs is in fact the correct choice for every single category on the board here. Including European game to watch. And Football League game to watch.
It should definitely be manager to watch, but if you want to read what we’d have put for Ange Postecoglou’s last stand it’s all in the response to that wretched failure to even try and attempt anything much at all against Liverpool.
There’s a case for both to be team to watch, with Villa looking to bounce back from last weekend’s shocker at Wolves and this time having the advantage rather than disadvantage of facing a team who played midweek. Spurs, of course, are rarely a bad choice for team to watch because lord knows there’s always some bullsh*t or other going on with them.
And all that adds up to a pretty convincing case for game to watch, especially as the last two meetings between these two have somehow ended in 4-1 and 4-0 wins for Spurs despite the fact Villa are quite good and Spurs are just awful.
But Big Weekend is a one game per category and one category per game kind of thing and we don’t make the rules. Well, we do, but never mind that.
Because if Villa v Spurs is only getting one category it has to be this one and this player doesn’t it? Rarely has any player dominated the agenda the way Marcus Rashford did throughout January, and that was without even actually playing actual football.
He probably won’t start, but Spurs fans will already be expecting him to score an It Just Had To Be Him winner from the bench.
It’s going to be fascinating to see how Rashford goes, how sharp he is or isn’t, whether just being literally anywhere other than Manchester United is enough to lift the weight from his shoulders and put a spring in his step. A new-club bounce, if you will.
But above all it’s just going to be really weird to see him in a different team’s kit. We’ll soon get used to it, we always do, but it’s not going to happen from game one. It’s going to be confusing and disorientating.
Also, assuming he doesn’t start, we hope he comes on relatively early, otherwise the long lingering shots of him sat on the bench are going to become very grating very quickly.
Team to watch: Manchester United
We weren’t prepared to break all the rules to put Villa-Spurs in every category, but we are going to bend them slightly here and include Friday night in the weekend. We’re confident it sits within most people’s accepted definition of ‘weekend’ but it never really has here.
But the fact it’s United makes an overwhelming case. They pretty much demand to be watched, just not in a good way.
Having sorted Arsenal out so impressively in round three – and Arsenal would definitely have been the team to watch against literally anyone if they were still in this – United have generally returned to their customary level for this season as a whole. That is, wretched.
We really do think last weekend represented a significant new low. Sure, there was a lot going on with Arsenal dismantling Man City while staying so very, very humble, but when This Is Manchester United Football Club We’re Talking About can lose 2-0 at home to Crystal Palace and the response of the wider football world is a half-interested shrug then you know things have got bad.
Hated, adored, and now quite frequently ignored.
And yet here we are, making them the team to watch. So yeah. United still have two plausible routes to silverware this season, and there’s no denying that winning a trophy for a third straight season while in such obvious crisis and distress would be quite something.
But such is the way with United this season that even a plum home draw against a Leicester side with far graver concerns at this time doesn’t feel like the gimme it ought to. To the extent that the fact it was Arsenal who United sorted out in round three makes it more rather than less likely they now make a bollocks of this far easier chance.
There has definitely been a sense this year of United being able to rouse themselves for the bigger occasions but not the more humdrum. Ruben Amorim has talked about it. Bruno Fernandes has talked about it.
But Leicester have thus far proved an exception to that rule, with United winning previous meetings with the Foxes in league and Carabao pretty cosily. A quirk of fate there, though, is that the man who will sit in the opposition dugout at Old Trafford on Friday night was in the home dugout for both those wins.
Ruud van Nistelrooy, bona fide United legend, has a rare chance to find himself on the winning side of the same fixture twice for each side during the course of a single season if he can steer Leicester to victory in this one and in the league next month.
Frankly, nothing involving United would surprise us now.
Manager to watch: Arne Slot
The surprising thing about Liverpool quadruple talk at this time is that there isn’t more of it. The only possible conclusion is that it’s because Slot is the manager now rather than Jurgen Klopp.
We say this because last year there was way, way more talk of a quadruple despite it never really ever being on, even in the inherently unlikely world of quadruples.
Slot’s Liverpool also probably won’t win the quadruple, because there’s a very good reason why no English side has ever done so. But when you get deep into February of your first season in a job with it looking as plausible as it now does, you have done something powerfully correct.
Liverpool are now odds-on favourites for two of the four, and clear favourites for a third in the Champions League.
Only here in the FA Cup do the bookies consider there to be a likelier winner, and we would humbly – always humbly – contend that Man City probably are not at this time in fact likelier winners than Liverpool.
An improving Plymouth side who pulled off one of the shocks of round three at Brentford stand in the way of Liverpool’s quest for immortality this weekend. Winning at Brentford was hugely impressive, but there are levels to this game.
Football League game to watch: Sunderland v Watford
A heavily FA Cup-impacted Championship schedule this weekend gives Sunderland the chance to boost their automatic promotion hopes at home to mid-table Watford and keep the good vibes rolling after ending a 20-year wait for victory on Teesside with a dramatic 3-2 win over Middlesbrough on Monday night.
Sunderland are unbeaten in the league this year, but a 2-2 draw with lowly Plymouth in their last home game wasn’t quite in the script.
Watford, meanwhile, have lost their last three and won only one of seven league games in 2025.
European game to watch: Real Madrid v Atletico Madrid
That’s the good stuff. A Madrid derby at the Bernabeu that pits first against second with Barcelona ready to pounce on any slip-ups in third. There are only four points separating that top three and every prospect of a La Liga title fight for the ages.
The curious thing is that it doesn’t really feel like Real Madrid have quite got it right this season. It’s taken a while to get anything like the best out of Kylian Mbappe and it still doesn’t really feel like a team that’s completely clicked.
So the fact they’re top of La Liga and through to the last four of the Copa del Rey and readying themselves for a Champions League knockout tie with Manchester City does have an ominous feel to it.
They slipped up badly last weekend against Espanyol, allowing an Atleti side who have themselves been patchy since the winter break to close within a point and mean top spot is now up for grabs in what should be a compelling derby day.
