FA Cup weekend.

 FA Cup weekend.

Ah yes! We can sense it from here. We can smell its wondrous fragrance. We can sigh with misty-eyed nostalgia. There is something in the air reminiscent of the good, old fashioned days. These were the days when small communities, villages the size of the conventional matchbox, towns with snug post offices, chemists, bakers and butchers would get very excited for reasons which would become starkly obvious. 

We recognise it for what it is because essentially this is the weekend when the footballing democracy shows its true colours. It is a very special weekend, a weekend for harbouring lifelong dreams, fulfilling those long held ambitions and just feeling a real sense of belonging in football's fairground atmosphere.This year is the one year when one famous competition is thrust under the footballing spotlight for different reasons, players around Britain plying their trade in a totally alien environment, taking stock for just a moment or two and pondering upon the law of probabilities. They imagine that the impossible may just become possible because you have to believe in miracles. 

This weekend marks the third round of the FA Cup, one of Britain's most stunning national treasures, that celebrated competition where the working-class proletariat lock horns with the glamorous noblesse oblige, the earls and dukes, the landed gentry of football's social fabric, the noblemen, the strutting peacocks, the monied aristocrats, the teams with a couple of million bob in the bank, the Premier League's big boys. 

In the old days the bombastic bourgeoisie who loved to turn their nose up at their so-called inferiors or lesser mortals would invariably fall at the first hurdle because stage fright had overcome them. But then there were the Yeovils, the Leatherheads, the Sutton Uniteds, the old Second Division Sunderland who once memorably humiliated old First Division Leeds in the 1973 FA Cup Final. Old Fourth Division Hereford beat top flight West Ham in another age and the underdog did snap and bark at the elegant Dachshunds, the teams with the more clearly defined pedigree but always wary of a giant-killing .

On Sunday non League Marine, a team from a suburban Liverpool outback, will be testing the FA Cup third-round waters with Premier League high fliers Spurs. In reality there can only be one result and Tottenham enter the FA Cup lion's den knowing that a cricket score against a bunch of part-timers can never be taken for granted. The FA Cup should be a level playing field when the Cup comes calling but sometimes current form takes a winter holiday and Jose Mourinho's Spurs may need to be on their guard.  

But the FA Cup third round will always be dominated by rosettes in shop windows, flags and banners richly festooned with saucy messages and people dressed up appropriately in their club's colours. In the old days the rattles were suitably oiled, hats and shirts splashed liberally with all the shades of the rainbow and so much more memorabilia. The klaxon horns were dug out of the cupboard and animals were symbolic, match day good-luck mascots. It was their day, their weekend and their chance to grab the permanent glory.

Tomorrow the likes of Marine and their lower division brethren will all be attempting at the first time of asking to dump their supercilious betters out of the FA Cup. It is the most daunting of assignments but they will kick off over the weekend feeling as though the romance of the FA Cup will leave the prettiest bouquet of flowers on their doorstep. Sometimes the candlelit dinner for two can often lead to the ultimate embarrassment for those who live their lives in the full glare of the Premier League limelight. 

Sadly, it may be safe to assume that come May the non-League part-timers will only be privileged observers in front of their TVs watching the Cup Finals from a respectful distance. There are some of us though who would love nothing better than egg on faces, damaged Premier League reputations, fallen big-time Charlies and the Premier League dandys who love to swan around with a superior air slipping on the banana skin and leaving the competition with a shamefaced smirk on their faces.

When Arsenal beat Chelsea in last August's FA Cup Final we thought we'd witnessed one of the strangest Cup Finals of all time. It was rather like watching a municipal library without any browsing readers and then expecting a member of staff to remain quiet when not a murmur could be heard. The 2020 FA Cup Final will always be known as the coronavirus FA Cup Final when Wembley Stadium began to resemble a scene from the Keystone Cops. No sound and only populated by hollering players. 

We must be wishing fondly that the 2021 FA Cup Final will once again welcome back its supporters and fans en masse shortly. A Wembley Stadium without 90,000 or a jam-packed 100,000 before health and safety intervened in recent years, was a sight to lift our hearts and move the soul. The FA Cup loves to tease and flirt outrageously, almost coquettish in its manner. But when the final whistles are blown at all of this weekend's FA Cup ding dong battles, we must hope that it will once again be victorious. 

When the FA Cup used to play its matches at 3pm on a Saturday afternoon in the prehistoric age, the headline makers would jump around joyously in their communal baths, bottles of milk spilling riotously down their cheeks and then wiping mud-caked faces with effervescent champagne. Now of course football has been dictated by satellite TV channels with vast sacks of money. Now football is spread across the whole of a working week and can be found at any time, day or place of  TV's choosing. Still as long the FA Cup can still remain at the forefront of our consciousness at some point in May then maybe we can get all sentimental all over again. Perhaps we can all meet up at Wembley stadium with  our friends and family one day. We'll be glad to see you all. We'll even buy you a pint.