1) Will Arsenal cope with the workload?

Arsène Wenger admitted his side were “not the sharpest” in beating Leicester during the week, with a hangover from the defeat in the north London derby to blame. However, Wenger’s side had better get used to the workload – Arsenal are the only team still in the FA Cup and Champions League. Alexis Sánchez, Jack Wilshere and Gabriel Paulista could all face Middlesbrough on Sunday but it will be interesting to see what sort of side Wenger selects for a competition that is very much third priority for the club.

Anything other than a full-strength, fully-motivated Arsenal could struggle. Boro, boasting the best defence in the Championship by quite a margin, have won five on the bounce in the league and have lost only once since mid-October. Also, the trip to the Emirates will not be intimidating: Boro were drawn away from home in rounds three and four, winning both 2-0, first, to no one’s great surprise against Barnsley, then stunningly against Manchester City. Boro hope and expect to be rubbing shoulders with Premier League sides from August. This is another good test – and it’s also a test of the strength and depth of Wenger’s squad. JA

2) Box-office bondage from Aston Villa and Leicester

With the eagerly anticipated movie adaptation of Fifty Shades of Grey out in cinemas this weekend, Villa Park will no longer have a monopoly on surprisingly well-attended exercises in tedium that climax in a beating. It was perhaps with this in mind that Randy Lerner finally lost patience with Paul Lambert, bundling him out of the exit door in an attempt to prevent otherwise loyal supporters from sitting out this uninspiring fifth-round tie in favour of a trip to the local World of Cine to witness a sadistic spanking of a different kind.

As Sunday lunchtime treats go, a week ago this FA Cup encounter between two of the Premier League’s bottom three sides had all the allure of a desiccated vegan nut roast but recent events have made it significantly meatier and more appetising. The dismissal of Lambert as Villa manager will have buoyed flagging spirits in the stands at Villa Park, where occupants will be interested to see what, if any, improvement their moribund team can muster under the temporary stewardship of the first-team coach, Scott Marshall, and his namesake, the goalkeeping coach, Andy.

Following his well-documented travails of recent days, including yet another valiant Premier League defeat, Nigel Pearson will be anxious to hoist two metaphorical fingers in the direction of the “fountains of knowledge” on Match of the Day held responsible by him for making a bigger deal than was necessary out of his touchline antics at the King Power Stadium last weekend.

A contest one cannot help but feel both sides would previously have been reasonably content to lose has been given something resembling a frisson. Who will dominate? Who will submit? And perhaps more pertinently, can we look forward to some touchline restraint? BG

3) Omens are not good for a classic at The Hawthorns

A Valentine’s Day FA Cup tie it may be but on the face of it this fixture crackles with all the romance of a post-pub knee-trembler up against a bus shelter. Both teams are capable of good football and this might well be a classic but it’s difficult to know who beyond supporters of the teams involved will be looking out for West Brom versus West Ham at lunchtime on Saturday.

Both the BBC and BT Sport been roundly panned for their choice of live broadcasts in this year’s competition, at times unfairly as there’s a certain amount of educated guesswork involved. However, with the national broadcaster having had first pick of this weekend’s eight ties and taken Preston versus Manchester United, it’s difficult to imagine the logic behind their rival’s decision to plump for a match of little interest to neutrals, when one featuring the League One side Bradford City, undisputed heroes of the last round entertaining Premier League opposition on a dreadful pitch ripe for an upset, has been completely overlooked. For all the misty-eyed guff they peddle about the magic of the FA Cup, those broadcasting it seem content to let general public interest in the grand old competition disappear. BG

4) Stoke can inject some spice into their season

Stoke are the Premier League’s undisputed kings of mid-table. In the past three years, after the sixth match of a season – once the peaks and troughs in the embryonic table have settled down – they’ve never been higher than eighth, they’ve never been lower than 17th, and even that was for two brief weeks in 2013-14. And that zen-like state of uneventfulness extends to the cup competitions – since reaching the FA Cup final in 2010-11, they had one sixth-round exit and two fourth-round departures, and their record is equally unremarkable of late in the League Cup. Nothing too bad to get angry about, nothing so good that it raises much excitement.

This, then, is a chance to get the pulses racing at the Britannia. The bookies have them as fifth favourites but they’ve already beaten one of the sides ahead of them in the betting this season (Arsenal), given another a proper scare (Manchester United) and narrowly lost away at another (Liverpool). It’s a tricky tie – Blackburn Rovers may be focused on the Championship play-off race but they’re no strangers to the business end of the competition, having been to the last eight in 2012-13 and to the final four in 2004-05 and 2006-07, and have one of the best home records in the division – but hopes should be high. JA

5) If you expect a Bradford victory and they oblige, does it still count as a shock?

If Sunderland’s players were as adept at passing the ball as their manager is the buck, Gus Poyet’s team would currently enjoy the luxury of being touted as genuine contenders for an FA Cup that ought to take a little less winning than usual. “You can’t analyse about passing the ball because nobody wanted to pass the ball here,” said Gus, going on to blame impatient home fans for pressurising his players into tearing up the repeatedly tried and increasingly untrusted Poyet blueprint that has had his ponderous side shuffling around the lower regions of the Premier League resembling extras from The Walking Dead.

When Sunderland’s fans and players aren’t at fault for poor results, Gus is never shy about pointing his Big Finger of Blame at referees but before Sunday’s trip to Bradford he has been getting his excuses in early by blaming the pitch. To be fair, his concerns are not without foundation as the Valley Parade sward is widely regarded as one of the worst playing surfaces in the Football League. Such is its deplorable state that even the third-tier side’s manager, Phil Parkinson, has publicly admonished his employers for failing to provide a hard-working groundsman he described as having been “hung out to dry” with “the help needed from upstairs to make it better”.

With Sunderland more used to snookering themselves on the comparatively smooth baize surfaces of various Premier League turfs, this weekend the ploughed field ought to act as Bradford’s ally. The Bantams are no route-one cloggers, as their excellent come-from-behind win against Chelsea in the last round demonstrated, but at least their players will be accustomed to the “nuance” of a surface so churned up and devoid of bounce that one of their recent home matches against Colchester came within a hair’s breadth of being postponed.

It is difficult to know just how seriously Poyet will take this match but defeat for whatever side he fields would not be well-received by the travelling 4,200. For all that, while a win for the League One side languishing 37 places beneath their visitors would constitute an FA Cup shock in the very technical sense, it would not come as any great surprise. BG





6) Derby have a final-day dress rehearsal

Derby and Reading have met twice already this season – once in the league and once in the Capital One Cup – with the Rams currently leading 5-0 on aggregate. And this is also a pre-run of Derby’s final-day fixture, when Reading will again be the visitors to the iPro Stadium. Given the spandex-tight state of the Championship automatic promotion race it would be no surprise if that game is a “£100m match” for the home club. There’s not quite as much riding on this game but both sides will see this as an opportunity. The Rams have bigger fish to fry but they have not been beyond this stage since 1998-99, when a team featuring Igor Stimac, Paulo Wanchope and Horacio Carbonari took them to the quarter-finals. That’s quite a wait for a club of Derby’s size. Reading, on the other hand, aren’t quite as far from the relegation zone as they’d like to be but are most likely in line for a couple of pretty dull months in the league. A bit of Cup excitement would pep up the start of Steve Clarke’s reign quite nicely. JA

7) United bid to continue an actually-quite-successful shambles

Louis van Gaal’s Manchester United are a conundrum. A tactical muddle, shakier at the back than a put-up-yourself wardrobe, constantly feeling shrouded by a strange miasma of uncertainty … and yet they could well end the season with a third-placed finish in the Premier League and another FA Cup win. That, given the state of the side at the end of last season, would be a triumph in anyone’s book. Van Gaal’s side didn’t so much flirt with embarrassment against Cambridge United in the last round as buy embarrassment a drink and attempt a few dodgy chat-up lines, and Preston, who haven’t reached the last eight since 1965-66, are more than capable of giving their neighbours another scare. It’s a bit of a thankless task for United – anything other than a comprehensive win will be seen as another weak display – but their manager will be eager to see a few signs of cohesion and a little more evidence that this sometimes shambling season can end in success. JA

Stoke’s last three seasons. Photograph: Guardian

8) A dilemma for Brendan

Selhurst Park has not been a happy hunting ground for Liverpool of late. We all remember the Scouse (and Uruguayan) wailing and gnashing of teeth that greeted the final whistle of their match against Palace at the back end of last season, while the abiding memory of November’s renewal was the sight of a forlorn and barely audible Brendan Rodgers sitting, head bowed, staring at a table-top as he struggled to make sense of it all. Again.

On an FA Cup weekend when it’s difficult to know just how many of the 16 managers involved will be entirely enthused by the prospect of progressing to the last eight of the tournament, the motivation of Alan Pardew is unlikely to be questioned. His team are enjoying their best form of the season and look to have more than enough about them to avoid relegation from the Premier League with a minimum of fuss, which means he can focus all his attention on heaping further embarrassment on Liverpool. As somebody who has played in an FA Cup final for Palace, scoring the winning goal against them in the semi-final en route, he has previous and will leave no stone unturned in his efforts to win this game and further enhance his status, having looked a completely beaten docket at Newcastle only a few months ago.

For Liverpool and Rodgers, a top-four finish and Champions League qualification must remain the priority but the spectre of further embarrassment in south London, not to mention Steven Gerrard’s well-documented date with birthday destiny at Wembley, will give Rodgers plenty to think about. With every Premier League fixture a Champions League qualifier in all but name from now on, does he field a full-strength side and risk losing big-name players to a treatment room already occupied by Gerrard and Lucas Leiva?

With the Europa League, another route towards qualification for the Champions League, resuming after its winter hiatus next week, the pragmatist in Rodgers could be excused for fielding a young second-string side against Palace and hoping for the best, while keeping his gaze focused solely on the bigger picture. Whether or not his considerable ego will permit such a sensible approach in the wake of recent Selhurst Park reverses remains to be seen. BG