Carling Cup 2011, Fourth Round Preview And Fixtures: Big Teams All Looking For Wins

It’s the most wonderful time of the year! The fourth round of the Carling Cup has traditional featured some of English football’s greatest ever moments, like that time last year when eight whole teams qualified for the quarter finals. Who can forget what happened in 2009/10, when eight teams qualified for the quarterfinals? Football. C’est magnifique, non?

Anyway, Aldershot Town are in for a bit of a hard time in Tuesday’s match - the League Two side have rather inconveniently drawn Manchester United at home, which will be awesome for the players but probably not so awesome for the scoreline, especially with the defending champions having been massacred by Manchester City at home on Sunday.

Meanwhile, we’ve got an all Premier League clash in name if not in talent as Bolton Wanderers wander on down to the Emirates to administer a much-needed ego boost to Arsene Wenger’s men, and then it’s Championship ahoy with Cardiff City hosting Burnley and Crystal Palace entertaining Southampton. Will four of the above mentioned teams go through? Yes. Will four fail? Also yes.

Wednesday is an entirely Premier League day, with Stoke City vs. Liverpool and Everton vs. Chelsea the most interesting matches going. It’s going to be a reasonably sunny, pleasant Wednesday in Stoke, which means Liverpool have a chance of advancing, and while Chelsea have overcome their Everton hoodoo in the league they’re going to be pushed fairly hard at Goodison Park.

The other matches feature Wolverhampton being massacred by Manchester City (I for one welcome our new sky blue overlords*) and Blackburn Rovers trying to bore Newcastle United/the noble viewer to death. Presumably someone will make that football match end - if they don’t I think we’re probably all in some kind of very weird, very specific hell. And I like watching Newcastle.

*I made that joke on Twitter yesterday. Is it cool that I recycle it?

Here’s the schedule:

Aldershot vs. Manchester United, 7:45 PM GMT (2:45 PM EST)
Arsenal vs. Bolton Wanderers, 7:45 PM GMT (2:45 PM EST)
Cardiff City vs. Burnley, 7:45 PM GMT (2:45 PM EST)
Crystal Palace vs. Southampton, 7:45 PM GMT (2:45 PM EST)

Stoke City vs. Liverpool, 7:45 PM GMT (2:45 PM EST)
Wolverhampton Wanderers vs. Manchester City, 7:45 PM GMT (2:45 PM EST)
Blackburn Rovers vs. Newcastle United, 8:00 PM GMT (3:00 PM EST)
Everton vs. Chelsea, 8:00 PM GMT (3:00 PM EST)