This was a bumpy, disconcerting ride for Erik ten Hag and long after the Manchester United manager negotiated more questions about Marcus Rashford’s apparent indiscipline. Rashford was conspicuous by his absence, not in the United squad that flew into Cardiff because, Ten Hag said, of an internal matter, days after the forward reported ill for training, hours after allegedly being pictured in a Belfast nightclub.
On the pitch, a United side assembled at a cost of more than £400m survived an almighty scare at a gutsy and defiant Newport County, a team 76 places below them in the pyramid made up of largely waifs and strays.
Newport trailed 2-0 inside 13 minutes, Bruno Fernandes and Kobbie Mainoo applying killer finishes to almost identical moves, but Newport stirred to ensure an enthralling encounter. Until Bryn Morris’s long-distance strike deflected in off Lisandro Martínez on 36 minutes, it seemed this tie would be something of an anticlimax, after all. Newport ensured anything but.
The last time they came from two goals down to take something? Boxing Day, only that was against a club facing relegation to non‑league, Forest Green Rovers, and not arguably the most storied club in the world, 12-time winners of this competition. Newport’s manager, Graham Coughlan, a United fanatic who attended a few of those finals and roped Ole Gunnar Solskjær into going in goal while doing his Uefa B licence, reminded his players of their fighting spirit at the interval. “We gave ourselves a little glimmer of hope,” Coughlan said afterwards.
That optimism was well placed. Two minutes into the second half, this rickety stadium went ballistic. Newport erected a temporary stand to accommodate an extra 1,000 supporters, enhancing the noise and boosting the capacity closer to 10,000. Those who could not get their hands on tickets resorted to creative measures. A couple of the terrace houses on Rodney Road, which overlook the pitch at one end of the Compeed Stand, created room for two dozen or so supporters to take in the game from makeshift scaffolded viewing platforms.
It was those supporters and those on the expanded North Terrace that had the best seats in the house when this place erupted when Will Evans, who until two years ago juggled playing part-time with milking cows on his parents’ farm in mid-Wales, converted Adam Lewis’s devilish low cross from the left. Lewis, the on-loan Liverpool left wing-back who went to school with Trent Alexander-Arnold, no doubt savoured every second of the aftermath.
Suddenly, United seemed shot, their early buffer a distant memory as the home support cheered every Newport block and basked in every United wrong move. Altay Bayindir, on debut, hoiked a pass straight out of play. “Everywhere we go, watching Newport County, putting on a show,” was the terrace chant now on loop. “I thought we had them,” Coughlan said. “I was dreaming. At 2-2, they were rattled and they were doing things that were a bit uncharacteristic. We just needed a few more magic moments.”
Coughlan had shook his head in disbelief as he headed in from the warmup. In the moments before the first whistle, Newport’s players – many of them, too, boyhood United fans, including the captain, Ryan Delaney and the long-serving defender Scot Bennett – lined up to shake hands with their United counterparts, the home players cradling their children in their arms, ramming home that these one-off occasions run far deeper than the dressing‑room walls. Bennett and the goalkeeper Nick Townsend previously tasted Newport’s appetite for giantkilling – they made life uncomfortable for Manchester City here in 2019 – and they were at it again. As the stadium announcer bellowed in the moments before kick-off: “It is fair to say Newport is on the map.”
A stoppage in play on 64 minutes when Townsend required treatment gave Coughlan a chance to get some instructions across and for his players to come up for air. In the week, Coughlan had stressed the need to suffocate United’s midfield at all times. Morris and Aaron Wildig, free transfers, relished the battle against Casemiro, a five-time Champions League winner, and Fernandes, signed for a combined £117m. Ten Hag must have felt a pang of relief four minutes later, when United regained the lead through Antony. Luke Shaw cut inside on to his right foot and sent a shot against Townsend’s left post but Antony was on hand to stab in the rebound.
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Coughlan cherished the few minutes he spent with Ten Hag afterwards, even if the Dutchman did not do all of his homework. “He congratulated us and thanked us for our hospitality as a club,” Coughlan said. “I just told him to stick in there … the resilience and the character that we have had to show at this club, he is having to do the same. I wished him all the best. He gave me a nice little bottle of red wine … but don’t tell him I don’t drink red wine, please.”
Newport, 16th in League Two, were a credit to themselves and indeed the pyramid. Newport, a squad assembled for pittance compared to United, pushed until the final whistle and that the game was not truly dead until the 94th minute, when Højlund was in the right place to fire in the rebound after the substitute Omari Forson was denied, was testament to their no-holds-barred performance. With barely a minute left on the clock, the Newport substitute James Waite forced Bayindir into a fingertip save. United had to work up a sweat to get the job done.
“The group represent me: I would never wave a white flag and they don’t either,” Coughlan said.
