Fairy dust, pixies and flying unicorns

The FA Cup stalks Stourbridge FC players during a training session. Photograph: Tony Marshall/The FA via Getty Images

LORD OF THE CUP: THE THREE TOWERS

Hello reader. Are you excited? Oh. Well, The Fiver is. We’re off out you see. Yeah, you’d better lock your doors. The phone rang last night and rather than hide under the bed with our fingers in our ears wishing it away, we picked it up because we knew it was Semi-Pro Fiver, our taxi-driving, socially adept, good-looking, non-league loving and much more fun cousin with a spare ticket to see Didcot Town v Exeter City on Sunday. Yeah, wow indeed. We’ve always wanted to see those three surviving cooling towers. Weird Uncle Fiver couldn’t go along after that incident with the Timotei bottle, so it was our turn to drink in the magic of the FA Cup Sponsored By Dubai-Based Airline. And what magic there will be in the first-round proper as talented players are lauded not for their ability to be able to do very good things with a football but because they happen to weld, bake, deliver milk, unplug sewage for a living or stand quite near the Class of 92 every so often. Yes, drink in the magic but only once you’ve swallowed down that great big dollop of condescension that comes with it.

But anyway, did we say we’re excited? Yes, because Didcot Town, of the Southern League Division One South & West – the lowest-ranked in the competition (even lower than Aston Villa) – are taking on the Grecians of League Two. There’ll be fairy dust, pixies and flying unicorns in the air at Loop Meadow as 2,300 giddy fans have actual fun instead of treating football like a mangy cat they just kick every so often when they don’t get their way. And if Didcot Town’s joint manager, Jamie Heapy, displays the kind of brazenness that led to him picking himself to play in the club’s highest-profile match in 108 years despite a nasty case of thigh-gah, we should be in for a belter. “This is by far the biggest match in terms of the financial package that’s on offer,” he cheered, before writing his name on a blackboard, circling it and then scrawling a big chalk arrow directed straight at Exeter’s goal. “I think we won a bit of money for the FA Vase, but nowhere near what this generates with ticket sales and the TV coverage.” Swoon! Meanwhile, the Roy Evans to Heapy’s Géd Houllier, Ian Concannon, has been too busy playing cliche bingo to pick himself. “At the end of the day, it’s a game of football. Anything could happen in 90 minutes and if we give a good account of ourselves, who knows?” he full-housed.

Elsewhere, there’s a Barry Hayles derby to look forward to at the Memorial Ground as the 43-year-old, who threatened to be quite good in the late 90s and also played for the Cayman Islands, Jamaica and Truro City in a globe-trotting career that surely doubled as a ruse for getting free air travel, returns to Bristol Rovers as manager of Chesham United. “I’ll have to do well to keep my emotions under wraps,” sniffed Hayles, while looking through his latest holiday snaps. “I think I did myself justice when I played for the club.” Elsewhere, do you remember when Portsmouth won the Cup in 2008? Oh ’Arry. Well, they play non-league Macclesfield on Saturday, desperate to avoid the searing pain of an FA Cup wedgie like the one non-league Aldershot gave them at this stage last season. And then there’s Deon Burton, 87, who’s hoping the ageing brand of magic that he’s spread around the globe at more than 20 clubs helps Worcester City make Sheffield United disappear. “The incentive for me is to play sides I’ve played against before,” cheered Burton, sounding not quite as excited as The Fiver hopes to be after a day out on the Tin in Didcot.

And if all this hasn’t made you feverish with excitement let Dave Laing, the chairman of Barwell, a team in a Leicestershire village so small it could post itself to another county, work his magic. “Everyone is buzzing,” he Bezzed, of the tie against Welling United. “Naturally, we’re the underdogs facing a National League side, but we’ve watched them and we know on our day we can beat sides at a higher level. The team is a mix of butchers, bakers and candlestick makers. We have heating engineers, electricians, window cleaners, carers – all sorts.” So there you go. Perhaps the most magical thing about the first round of FA Cup Sponsored By Dubai-Based Airline is its ability to advertise all the many career paths that are open to today’s disenfranchised youth. Only not the one that involves playing football for a living.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“Religiously, it is said that God created man. I am only a guide. I allow others to express what they have in them. I have not created anything. I am a facilitator of what is beautiful in man” – the world according to Arsène Wenger.

FIVER LETTERS

“I can’t believe you made me do this. Re: Tim Grey (yesterday’s Fiver letters). There are considerably more than 60 references of ‘no’ in 2 Unlimited’s magnum opus. I know, because I just went and listened to the [Snip – Fiver Bad Word Ed]. Twice. Thanks for that. It’ll be in my head now for at least three years. For the record, the lyrics say 79 (see attached, shame-bringing screenshot), but a listen to the song reveals a few more not in the lyrics at the end, bringing it, by my count, to 84. Can I have Tim’s prizeless letter o’the day prize, given he’s disqualified?” – Nigel Morrison [no, because you failed to attach your shame-bringing screenshot – Fiver Ed].

“I see from his latest interview cited in Big Paper, that famed Manchester City fan Noel Gallagher is launching his own ‘Stop Music’ campaign to rival that of your crusade. Like The Fiver, Mr Gallagher seems to be living off past glories and relying on saddo 40-somethings for what is inevitably a declining fanbase” – Duncan Roberts.

“Tim Clarke’s suggestion that managers might be sent to the USS Do One (yesterday’s Fiver letters) is entirely fanciful as vessels with the USS designation are from the Star Trek universe and therefore not real. If we are to persist with the notion of imaginary spacecraft for superannuated managers, might I suggest the Continent class GSV Full Confidence of the Board” – Dermot McDermott.

• Send your letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. And if you’ve nothing better to do you can also tweet the Fiver. Today’s winner of our prizeless letter o’the day is: Duncan Roberts.

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RECOMMENDED VIEWING

Because these things always go down so well with fans of the two teams involved, here’s a possible combined north London derby XI.

BITS AND BOBS

If you don’t back Marcel Ndjeng to win this year’s Puskás Award, then we can’t be friends.

Meanwhile, Philipp Schobesberger’s Big Vase winner for Rapid Vienna against Viktoria Plzen is next year’s winner.

Louis van Gaal wants Manchester United fans to boo him and not the players. If they feel the need to, of course. “It’s better to whistle at the manager,” he roared, flapping his outstretched hands in the let’s-have-some style. “I can cope with it because I have had a lot of experience in it in my life as a manager.”

Lorient striker Majeed Waris has been banned for six matches after being sent off for a tremendous off-the-ball hack at Guingamp’s Jimmy Briand. “I should not have done it but I had no intention of hurting him or to kill him,” he chuntered. “I just wanted to scare him.”

New Aston Villa manager Rémi Garde has no pretence that he will be the saviour of the Premier League basement dwellers, swiftly getting a step up on his predecessor in the process. “I’m not a dreamer or a magic man,” he sighed. “I have strong ideas. Maybe that was why I stopped at Lyon.”

Alan Shearer is set to have a road named after him near Blackeye Rovers’ Ewood Park. Vicious Elbow Close is due to open next month.

And mayor Joseph Fitzgerald O’Malley Fitzpatrick O’Donnell The Edge “Joe” Quimb … sorry, D1ck Sweatman has leapt to the defence of “a racy angle-grinding display” during an advertised fireworks celebration at East Grinstead Town FC. “I don’t think anyone minded that the girls were dressed in skimpy outfits,” he purred. “Their performances were very theatrical and I think everyone enjoyed it. I think most people were just worried about them being cold.” Not everyone. “The dad next to us had to explain to kids why a woman had fire coming out of her bum,” tweeted one visitor.

STILL WANT MORE?

“If I’d have had this start in the Premier League or the Championship, I probably would have lost my job” – Stevenage manager Teddy Sheringham has a chinwag with Jacob Steinberg.

From Portland to Hamburg, through Spain to Italy and on to a leafy London borough, Barry Glendenning travels the world of hipsters’ favourite football clubs with this week’s Joy of Six.

Premier League: 10 things to look out for this weekend.

Jamie Vardy stars in the latest edition of You are the Ref.

How will FC United of Manchester continue to prioritise fans over finances as their club thrives, muses Richard Foster.

Oh, and if it’s your thing … you can follow Big Website on Big Social FaceSpace.