Arsenal v Leeds United: FA Cup third round – live! | Football

20 min: Arsenal are a shambles at the back. Nelson, running back towards his own goal, is easily stripped of possession by Alioski, who slips a pass wide left for Bamford. Alioski clumsily bundles him over. A free kick in a very dangerous position, just to the left of the area.

19 min: Luiz plays a ridiculous ball out of defence, an easy interception for Alioski, who should do better than standing up a cross, intended for Bamford, that’s easy for Holding to head out for a corner. The set piece comes to nothing.

17 min: Harrison drops a shoulder to leave Kolasinac in the dust down the right. Another shot from distance. Martinez, who will have warm hands, deals with this one too. Leeds will wonder how they’re not ahead.

15 min: Leeds hit the bar! Klich glides in from the right and lays off to Bamford, who one-twos a pretty triangle with Harrison, enters the box, and smashes a shot off the crossbar from 12 yards out, a little to the right. He probably should have scored, but the quality of the move was such that you can’t complain too much. Leeds are playing some fine football. Can we have them back in the Premier League, please? Enough’s enough.

14 min: Harrison has a dig from 20 yards. It’s a fine, rising effort, and Martinez does very well to claw it away from the top-right corner. This match is being played at 101 mph.

12 min: Xhaka goes on a sensational 60-yard run down the left wing. He then tries to release Ozil into the box, but in attempting a slide-rule pass, punts clumsily out for a goal kick. That’s like walking a couple of miles home with the house keys, to let your locked-out family in, only to drop them down the drain in front of the porch.

11 min: Ayling and Alioski combine well down the right, the former eventually hooking across from the byline for Douglas, who is completely unmarked in the middle, six yards out and onside! But the cross is a foot too high for Douglas. What a let-off for Arsenal, who are all over the shop at the back.

10 min: Leeds are putting the Arsenal defence under pressure with their hard press. Holding is forced into a shank out of play. From the throw, Bamford latches onto Harrison’s whipped right-wing cross and flashes a header out of play on the right. This is good stuff from Leeds, both on and off the pitch. A hell of an atmosphere, some good old-fashioned cup bedlam.

8 min: Pepe looks in the mood for Arsenal, even if the rest of his team-mates aren’t up to speed yet. Now he lashes a shot towards the top left from 20 yards; it’s easy enough for Meslier, but a decent effort nonetheless.

7 min: Harrison latches onto a dismal Holding pass out of defence, and goes racing towards the Arsenal box. Leeds are three on two. Harrison slots one down the inside-left channel for Bamford, who is in less space than the man in blue out on the right. Bamford shoots, only to see his shot blocked for a corner that comes to nothing. Leeds should have worked Martinez at the very least.

6 min: It’s mainly Leeds in these opening exchanges. They’re pinging it around nicely. But hold on! Douglas loses control in the centre circle, and misses a tackle on Pepe, allowing the winger to sashay down the middle of the park with great purpose. He’s crowded out before he can get to the Leeds box, but what a fine run.

4 min: Alioski takes the free kick, sending it curling towards the far post. Bamford gets eyebrows on it, but can only help it out for a goal kick.

3 min: Douglas rakes a long ball towards Bamford, who can’t win the heading duel with Luiz, but then Guendouzi bundles over Alioski as they compete for the loose ball. A free kick for Leeds, just to the left of centre, 40 yards out.

2 min: Leeds are out of the blocks quickly, pressing, pressing, pressing. A sign that they’re not here to mess about. Bamford is nearly released down the left, but Luiz snuffs out his run. A lively start by the visitors.

And we’re off! Leeds get the rerun of the 1972 final going. A fantastic atmosphere at the Emirates.

The teams are out! Arsenal in red shirts with white sleeves, Leeds in third-choice powder blue. We’ll be off in a minute!

Right, I’m back. What a draw, eh? Eh? Anyway, back to tonight’s big game, and let’s find out who’ll be travelling to Bournemouth in the fourth round. No bombshells in the pre-match interviews, other than the revelation that Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang is ill.

Before the big kick-off at the Emirates, the draw for the fourth round will be made. That means some downtime for this MBM, as I nip across to populate the live blog with the fate of your favourites. See you over there, and we’ll all meet back here before the match? Great, it’s a plan.

♫ ♯ ♪ Memories light the corners of your mind, distant snow-covered memories, of the way we were ♪ ♫ “The Arsenal v Leeds tie in 1991 went to a whopping three replays,” recalls Matt Emerson. “I vividly recall the second one being during a bitterly cold spell in London and tuned in to Capital Gold to hear the great news that they’d cleared the snow off the pitch and – thanks to Arsenal’s fabled undersoil heating – the match was definitely on. I duly went along: it ended nil-nil. Happy days.”

A night off for Arsenal’s leading scorer and captain, then. But Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang has made his presence felt at the Emirates tonight nonetheless. Ahead of a month of frenzied transfer-window speculation, he’s sought to shut down all idle chat surrounding his future. Arsenal fans will enjoy reading the captain’s notes in their official matchday programme this evening. Unless the first letter of each paragraph spells A-C-T-U-A-L-L-Y-I-M-O-F-F-S-E-E-Y-A, in the style of former Autocar employee James May, we haven’t checked that closely.

Arsenal make four changes to the side that beat Manchester United last week. Emiliano Martinez, Rob Holding, Reiss Nelson and Matteo Guendouzi take the places of Bernd Leno, Lucas Torreira, Ainsley Maitland-Niles and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.

Leeds make five changes to the team sent out to draw at West Brom in their last match. Illan Meslier and Robbie Gotts make their debuts, alongside the recalled Gaetano Berardi, Barry Douglas and Patrick Bamford. Casilla, Liam Cooper, Stuart Dallas, Eddie Nketiah and Helder Costa make way.

Arsenal: Martinez, Sokratis, Luiz, Holding, Nelson, Guendouzi, Xhaka, Kolasinac, Ozil, Pepe, Lacazette.
Subs: Leno, Ceballos, Mavropanos, Willock, Martinelli, John-Jules, Saka.

Leeds United: Meslier, Ayling, Berardi, White, Douglas, Phillips, Alioski, Gotts, Klich, Harrison, Bamford.
Subs: Cooper, Casilla, Dallas, Helder Costa, Davis, Stevens, Casey.

Referee: Anthony Taylor (Cheshire).

Arsenal and Leeds United first met in the FA Cup in 1950. Leeds, then as now, were in the second tier, but a defence led by legend-in-making John Charles gave a good account of itself. They restricted the hosts to the one, decisive goal, as Alex Forbes beat three men down the left and fed Don Roper, who crossed for Reg Lewis to head home. Arsenal went on to win the cup. Leeds missed out on promotion.

The next time the teams met in the cup was the 1972 final. Leeds were the best team in the land back then, the bosses of England from 1965 to 1974, though much good that did them in terms of overall trophy haul. By way of illustration, it was Arsenal who were reigning double champions at the time; Leeds righted some wrongs by prevailing 1-0 at Wembley thanks to Mick Jones’ pullback and Allan Clarke’s diving header. It remains their only FA Cup.

Arsenal, by contrast, have 13 of the things. They’ve also got much the better of Leeds in the cup head-to-heads, having knocked them out in 1983, 1991, 1993, 2004, 2011 and 2012. Leeds’ only FA Cup victory during that time came in 1997, when an early Rod Wallace goal was enough to see off the Gunners at Highbury.

Leeds have won just one of their last five games in the Championship. They won’t want to be narrowly missing out on promotion again like they did in 1950 (and last year), so aren’t likely to compromise their push for the Premier League by picking a full-strength side. Arsenal might give it a good old go, though. So for a few reasons, the hosts are the hot favourites tonight. But anything can happen in the FA Cup. It’s on!

Kick off: 7.56pm GMT. Heads up!