Mark Hughes to decide Stoke City FA Cup third round fate.
The FA Cup third round draw, how to watch it, start time and the all-important ball numbers as former Stoke City manager Mark Hughes is handed big task.
Stoke City will discover their FA Cup third round opponents tonight as Championship and Premier League clubs enter the competition.
Stoke reached the fifth round in 2022 and 2023, when they were eventually knocked out by Crystal Palace and Brighton and Hove Albion respectively, but they haven’t made it past the third in the other six seasons going back to 2017.
This time there are only two non-league clubs still standing in Dagenham and Redbridge, who beat Crewe Alexandra in the first round; and Tamworth, who are the only other remaining Staffordshire side in this season’s tournament having knocked out Burton Albion. Port Vale were defeated by Barnsley.
The draw is due to take place from 7pm on Monday, December 2 and it will be made by former Stoke manager Mark Hughes and his old Manchester United colleague Dion Dublin. Hughes’s best run in this competition while he was with the Potters was in 2015, when his side got past Wrexham and Rochdale, when Bojan suffered that terrible injury, before being shocked by Blackburn Rovers.
While the exact time for the draw itself hasn’t yet been confirmed, coverage on BBC Two begins at 7pm.
In previous years the draw has been included in the One Show, but this year it will have its own designated, half-hour, slot. The show will be hosted by Kelly Somers, with help from Hughes, who won the cup four times as a player, and Dublin.
Traditionally the FA Cup third round weekend is the first weekend of the New Year, but this year games will take place across the weekend of January 11 and 12. Games are likely to be televised on Friday 9th and Monday 13th, too.
