Neville back in favour for replay at Reading

It was Sir Alex Ferguson's intention to "leave out the older players" for Manchester United's fifth-round FA Cup replay against Reading tonight, but for Gary Neville the rules have changed over the last few days. The club captain was left out on Saturday amid suggestions that Ferguson wanted to punish him for a dispute between the pair during the match against Lille last week.

Whether Neville gets a reprieve tonight - with the Premiership lunchtime kick-off against Liverpool looming on Saturday - will be a sign that he has served his punishment, a rare sanction for a player who has served Ferguson without a hint of indiscipline for 15 years. Having turned 32 this month, he has watched many team-mates fall out with Ferguson over the years but stayed firmly onside himself.

Neville could clearly be seen swearing at Ferguson when the United manager tried to usher him away from the Lille players as they seemed about to walk off in protest at Ryan Giggs' quickly taken free-kick.

Neville's rest on Saturday could now mean that he is among a United team tonight that will be changed with the Liverpool game in mind and will not feature, according to Ferguson, Paul Scholes, Ryan Giggs and Henrik Larsson. Even in spite of the admissions by Ferguson, it seems that a far greater percentage of his first team will feature than Reading's, as Steve Coppell again made no apology yesterday for picking an almost identical side to the largely second-string XI that played at Old Trafford.

"It will almost be the exact same team," he said, "and I don't mind anyone knowing that."

Coppell said that the replay and the Premiership game against Arsenal on Saturday were not games that he expected to win.

"We can't lose these next two games as far as I'm concerned," he said. "Given the agenda we had at the start of the season, even if we do lose we can't lose, but that's not an indication of our approach. We'll just give it our best shot and try and win both games. But realistically, who would relish playing Man United and Arsenal in two consecutive games? Most teams wouldn't, but in our circumstances we have nothing to lose. We'll just crash on."

Having made eight changes from the team that played United in the first game for last weekend's game against Middlesbrough, Coppell said that he had not yet decided on his formation for the replay - "that is something me and my nightmares will handle", he added.

"I wouldn't say having home advantage means anything, given their quality. Wenger says it sometimes, against Bolton, that they probably have a better chance away from home because teams play a certain way against them at the Emirates. That doesn't apply to us, but I'm sure Fergie isn't frightened about coming to the Madejski Stadium. In the last 10 minutes [at Fulham on Saturday], they had six players up front. In many ways you are in awe of these teams when they are flowing.

"You look at their ability going forward and you think 'Wow'. Our dilemma is do we go hell for leather, which is often admirable but fails, or do we be more circumspect and tailor our game?"

For United, Alan Smith could be in the squad for the first time since the Carling Cup defeat at Southend in October and Kieran Richardson could return. "The one thing you know about Alan Smith is that he has great courage and great enthusiasm to play football and that will always give him a chance," Ferguson said. "Alan has been unfortunate because of the form of the team, but he still has a long-term future at the club."

Interesting? Click here to explore further