by David Barber

The FA Cup with Budweiser
Fifth Round Proper
Weekend of Saturday 16 February 2013
Winning clubs receive £180,000 from The FA's Prize Fund
Click here for all the Fifth Round ties

This season’s FA Cup competition, the 132nd in history, has its eight Fifth Round ties spread over four days. There are four on Saturday, two on Sunday, one on Monday and one on 27 February.

The eight Fifth Round ties in season 1992-93 were all won by the home side and there were no replays.

The results were...

Arsenal 2-0 Nottingham Forest
Blackburn Rovers 1-0 Newcastle United
Derby County 3-1 Bolton Wanderers
Ipswich Town 4-0 Grimsby Town
Manchester City 2-0 Barnsley
Sheffield United 2-1 Manchester United
Sheffield Wednesday 2-0 Southend United
Tottenham Hotspur 3-2 Wimbledon

That had never happened before in the Fifth Round – and hasn’t happened since.

By contrast, seven of the eight Fifth Round ties in season 1985-86 went to a replay.

The results then were...

Derby County 1-1 Sheffield Wednesday
Luton Town 2-2 Arsenal
Peterborough United 2-2 Brighton & Hove Albion
Southampton 0-0 Millwall
Tottenham Hotspur 1-2 Everton
Watford 1-1 Bury
West Ham United 1-1 Manchester United
York City 1-1 Liverpool

So only Everton, who went on to reach The Final, won through at the first time of asking – and the word ‘or’ featured a lot in the Sixth Round draw!

The first season with a ‘Fifth Round’ was 1925-26 and in one of the ties Manchester City beat Crystal Palace 11-4 with Frank Roberts scoring five. Before that, there were just four ‘proper’ rounds before the Semi-Finals.

Luton Town of the Conference Premier are the seventh non-League side to reach the Fifth Round since the war. The others have been Colchester United (1948), Yeovil Town (1949), Blyth Spartans (1978), Telford United (1985), Kidderminster Harriers (1994) and Crawley Town (2011).

A non-League club hasn’t made the Quarter Finals since 1914, when then Southern League outfit Queens Park Rangers lost 2-0 to Liverpool.