Manager knows his quadruple-chasers have a target on their back in their FA Cup fifth round trip to Mansfield

Mikel Arteta knows the score. There is a reason why Arsenal’s trip to Mansfield Town on Saturday is the tie of the FA Cup fifth round, why it has been selected by TNT Sports for a 12.15pm kick-off. It has all the ingredients and everybody – Arsenal fans aside – is looking for an upset. Arteta was asked whether he was clear on that point. “Yes,” the Arsenal manager replied.

It has always been this way when a top club visits a minnow and, to repeat, the plotlines are certainly there for this one. Mansfield are 16th in League One, too close to the relegation line for the comfort of the manager, Nigel Clough. The Stags have gone nine league matches without a win.

• Ireland 27-17 Wales

• Wales give Ireland a fright before hosts hang on

The pre-match predictions that Ireland would win with a bonus and Wales would get nothing tangible from it were wholly correct. Never, however, has so much been lost in the nuts and bolts of the sums adding up.

Wales were magnificent, good enough to reduce the home team and a raucous full house to sweaty souls praying for the final bell. When it came it had become a two-score game. The fear factor had subsided a few minutes earlier, but only when Jack Crowley managed to kick a handy penalty, though at this level there are not many kicks in that category for him.

This time around, Liverpool made no mistake at Molineux. They stayed on the road to Wembley, thanks to two players signed in 2017, beloved veterans with uncertain futures. Andy Robertson and Mohamed Salah scored the goals to ease the pain of Tuesday’s Premier League defeat before Curtis Jones’s strike completed a night of relative comfort. Wolves crashed back to the reality of eight remaining top-flight matches before the drop. Their goal from Hwang Hee-chan came far too late.

While Arne Slot expresses disappointment at the Premier League’s entertainment levels, a verdict hostage to fortune on Tuesday, his starting selection suggested an FA Cup exit would not be countenanced. Winning the trophy will not offer full job security but losing twice at the top flight’s bottom club in three days, a potentially telling blow, was avoided.

Rule changes will affect driver style and car performance with world champion Lando Norris already under scrutiny

With the long and increasingly febrile buildup almost at an end, Formula One is finally ready to go racing into the sport’s new era. Whether it will prove a success is one of many questions that will be answered at the season-opener in Melbourne this weekend, as will the most pressing concern: which team and driver enter this brave new world on top of the pile?

In the paddock at Albert Park this week, teams and drivers increasingly had an air of the stony-faced stare-down of a cold war summit amid caginess about their prospects. No one wanted to give anything away nor make predictions.

England have beaten the Azzurri in all 32 meetings over the last 35 years but that record could slip in Rome on Saturday

Most England fans will remember the classic final scene in The Italian Job. The bus precariously balanced on the edge of a precipice, the golden loot slipping away. One false move and it’s curtains. Welcome to this weekend’s sequel with Steve Borthwick and his under-pressure England players replacing Michael Caine – “Hang on a minute, lads, I’ve got a great idea” – and the rest of the original film’s cast.

Talk about the self-preservation society. England’s recent car-crash defeats by Scotland and Ireland were pretty grim but there have been any number of precedents over the years. What has never materialised in 32 previous meetings dating back 35 years is a loss to Italy. If that sequence ends on Saturday it really would be a new reputational low

Garnacho gets his chance to stake a claim, a big day for Port Vale and more scheduling concerns for Guardiola

Who would have thought approaching mid-March Wolves would be the Midlands team – at least in the Premier League – with the most to cheer? Aston Villa, while fourth and still capable of securing a place in the Champions League, are wobbling. Nottingham Forest are fighting relegation. In the Championship, Coventry are at the summit but West Brom and Leicester are in danger of dropping into League One. Wolves and third-tier Mansfield are the only Midlands sides remaining in the FA Cup and, while the latter host Arsenal, the former may quietly fancy their chances when Liverpool visit Molineux for the second time in four days. Rob Edwards’s side triumphed on Tuesday and, while it got lost amid the stoppage-time drama, he made several changes with Friday’s Cup tie in mind. “Does it have to be one or the other?” Edwards said. “No, so we are going to try and win both. It is going to be a really exciting night.” Ben Fisher

Wolves v Liverpool, Friday 8pm (all kick-offs GMT)

Mansfield v Arsenal, Saturday 12.15pm

Wrexham v Chelsea, Saturday 5.45pm

Newcastle v Manchester City, Saturday 8pm

• Tottenham beaten 3-1 by Palace as Van de Ven sent off

• Interim manager admits the situation is ‘very difficult’

Igor Tudor insisted that the “boat is going in the direction I want to go” despite a shambolic 3-1 defeat to Crystal Palace, deepening Tottenham’s relegation fears.

Although the atmosphere was toxic on another grim night at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, Tudor is confident that he can steer his new side to safety. Tottenham have lost each of their three games under their interim manager and are a point above the bottom three after Micky van de Ven’s red card kickstarted an implosion against Palace.

• All World Cup matches to break after 22 minutes of each half

• Adverts can be either normal breaks or split-screen version

ITV is in talks with its commercial partners about showing adverts during the mid-half drinks stoppages that will take place in every match at this summer’s World Cup.

Global broadcasters have been briefed on Fifa’s stipulations for the three-minute hydration breaks, which will take place after 22 minutes of each half irrespective of the temperature.

• India 253-7 bt England 246-7 by seven runs

• Multiple records broken in thrilling match

England, India and the Wankhede Stadium ground staff conjured a ludicrous, blockbuster semi-final, but for the English in the end it was a bust, a night when records fell, and they eventually went with them.

Only three times in their history have they scored more than the 246 they got on Thursday, but still it was not enough. Never before have so many runs been scored in a T20 World Cup match, nor as many sixes (34), nor more sixes in an innings than India’s 19. Neither England nor India had ever conceded as many runs in any T20 anywhere as they did here. It was dizzying stuff, ending in appropriate style with Jofra Archer scoring sixes off the last three legal deliveries to trim the winning margin to just seven runs. So India march on to the final, with only New Zealand in Sunday’s final standing between them and a third T20 World Cup title.