FA Cup Fifth round/ Manchester Utd 1 Reading 1: In a season when Goliath has generally kicked David's butt, Reading's feat in extending Manchester United to a replay is worthy of much admiration and feels like some consolation for this season's shortage of giantkilling feats.

Except Reading deserve more than to be patronised as just another small club who got lucky. This is a team whose artillery is far more advanced than a sling and a stone.

The beauty of it is they seem completely unfazed by all the attention that is coming their way. The message emanating from the dressing room on Saturday evening was quiet and understated: good result but nothing to get too excited about. As for the rest of us, we can only stand back in admiration.

Reading are rapidly becoming everyone's "second club" and their results provoke a very obvious question: how do they do it? There is no straightforward answer but the club's sudden ability to cut it with the elite is no fluke.

These are honest men, doing their honest best, but there is more than just sweat and endeavour - how depressing that Steve McClaren has not found time in his schedule to visit the Madejski Stadium in his seven months as England manager.

If McClaren ever dares to think about picking a player from unfashionable Reading there is plain evidence that, with Ashley Cole injured, Nicky Shorey is a country mile ahead of Phil Neville, Gareth Barry and all the rest as the most accomplished left back in the country.

Equally, Steve Sidwell's admirers are entitled to wonder how he can be overlooked when Joey Barton is now considered England class.

These are not complaints that a club of Reading's dignity would make in any other way than in private, however. It is not their way to stamp feet, and that is part of their charm. Alex Ferguson, for all his qualities, should take note because there was something distasteful about the manner in which he vigorously complained how the BBC had been "hardly fair" arranging the game for a 5.15pm kick-off when United have a Champions League game at Lille tomorrow. No matter. Ferguson's gripes were largely lost in the afterglow of a pulsating Cup tie in which Reading contributed so richly that it seemed impertinent to dwell on what might have been achievable if Coppell had not fielded half a dozen reserves.

The conclusion drawn by many was that the Berkshire side may have done a proper job of bloodying United's nose. That, however, is a hypothetical argument, and one that ignores the significant contribution made by understudies, if that is the right term, such as Bobby Convey and Dave Kitson. Convey epitomised the team's indefatigability when, with 70 minutes gone, they lost possession in one attack and he chased Park Ji-sung from penalty area to centre circle. Kitson showed that a centre forward need not score to make a handsome contribution.

Others flourished with such vigour that it seemed Coppell had sprinkled magic dust over his squad.

Was Reading's goalscoring hero the same Brynjar Gunnarsson who became a figure of ridicule for Nottingham Forest fans on their descent through the leagues?

This is not to overlook the fact that United still ought to make it to the quarter-finals. It does not always have to be that one team played well and the other did not, or that one side succeeded and the other failed. United left the pitch to a definite sense of regret, having failed to build upon Michael Carrick's splendid goal, but that does not automatically make it a bad performance.

They were deprived of a perfectly good goal when a trigger-happy linesman ruled Ole Gunnar Solskjaer offside and it would be wrong to criticise Ferguson's players for anything, perhaps, other than their habit of conceding goals from corner kicks. Adam Federici, Reading's stand-in goalkeeper, was in inspired form and credit should go to the Australian rather than criticism being apportioned to those he thwarted.

As for the replay, both managers intend to play watered-down teams. Ferguson's priority is the Premiership and the Champions League. Coppell's is a European place.

Which is strange. When Gunnarsson was asked whether he would rather play in an FA Cup final or the Uefa Cup he instinctively replied: "FA Cup, of course." Wrong answer. He should have said: "Both."

• Guardian Service