IT'S FA Cup time - and the competition still has the magic for me.

What's more, Saturday's third-round tie at Charlton is another chance to make life tougher for one of our promotion rivals, even though it is a cup game.

If they win, they might take confidence from it and we don't really want to give that to a team like the Addicks, who are seven points behind us in the Championship table.

We beat Charlton 4-2 live on Sky TV last month and this is a very important game.

I've never really had a run in the FA Cup.

The furthest I reached with Stoke was the fifth round two seasons ago, when we lost 1-0 to Birmingham.

I would love a run in the cup.

The FA Cup final between Nottingham Forest and Tottenham in 1991 was one of the first English games I watched on TV.

Stuart Pearce scored a great free-kick for Forest to put them ahead but they lost 2-1.

I don't think the FA Cup is as big as it used to be because the league is so important these days.

But it's still a massive competition - especially in the later stages.

It's great to know we'll be backed by more than 2,000 fans at The Valley.

As I've said before, our away support has been magnificent this season.

Unfortunately, we didn't deliver what they wanted on New Year's Day by losing 2-0 at Ipswich.

It was a bad defeat. We didn't play well.

We started quite well but Ipswich were really at it and got more and more into the game.

They proved why they are unbeaten in 13 home games this season.

Now we have to bounce back because we are in a good position in the league.

New Year as a whole was pretty much a non-event for us players.

It was just like any normal build-up to a match.

I was in my hotel bed by 10.30pm on New Year's Eve!

Hopefully, 2008 will be a great year for the club.

The Scunthorpe win on Saturday was a great result for us.

It was just a shame we could not build on the three-point gap that result gave us at the top.

But at least we're still in first position on goal difference - and it's up to us now.

We need to start trying to build a gap between us and the rest - but we have to take things one game at a time.

Simply put, we've got to win more games than the other sides. 

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