"We took a good cracking": Dons boss Warne recalls his FA Cup memories

FA Cup memories are some of the most romantic and important in a footballer’s career, and that is the case for MK Dons boss Paul Warne too.

After a playing career of more than 500 games, Warne has also managed just shy of the same number, with the FA Cup a regular feature during his time in the game.

This weekend, he takes on his first FA Cup chapter with MK Dons when they take on Colchester United at the JobServe Community Stadium. When the draw first took place, the head coach admitted neither side will have looked at it as a mouth-watering encounter, especially as the sides are set to meet each other barely two months later in the league.

However, to the winner on Saturday go the potential spoils too, with the opportunity at some memories to savour in the offing.

He said: “As a player, it’s weird because you have a few games before the proper round in January, and if you’re fortunate enough to get the positive results to get there, you end up with the possibility of a really good fixture.

“Colchester isn’t a draw that either club have thought is an exciting one, but one of us will go through, and then if you go through another round, and all of a sudden it is good. It’s great for the players and the fanbase.”

Warne’s best moments in the competition came at Rotherham, both as a player and a manager. In 2001, the Millers drew Liverpool away at Anfield in the third round. Though they were beaten 3-0, Warne was a starter against the Reds in a peak moment of his career.

Meanwhile as a manager, he also tasted defeat against Premier League opposition when, as Rotherham manager, they took on Manchester City at the Etihad Stadium in 2019 - a game which ended in Pep Guardiola’s side running out emphatic 7-0 winners.

“My FA Cup memories - neither are victorious but amazing in different ways,” he said. “My stand-out (as a player) was Liverpool at Anfield. A lot of my friends came from Norfolk, and I hadn’t been a professional footballer for long, so that was a real treat. We lost 3-0 but I remember us hitting the crossbar in the first-half and thinking we’d done well.

“It was the likes of Heskey, Owen, Carragher, and I remember looking at them in the tunnel thinking ‘wow, I know all of them!’ They played a proper team, which I thought was cheating!

“As a manager, I had the joy, I say loosely, of managing against Man City at the Etihad and we took a good cracking. The players were really excited, so was the owner, but the coaching staff thought ‘this could go horribly’ and after 20 minutes, we were doing ok!

“We ended up losing 7-0. But a few weeks later, I think it was Schalke lost 8-0, Burton lost 9-0, so it wasn’t a shameful result.

“The fourth official came over to me in the 89th minute and told me it was zero minutes of added time. I hugged him, kissed him and told him that was the nicest thing anyone had ever said to me!”