Lee Sandford rescued Sheffield United with his first goal of the season three minutes from the end to give his side a welcome place in the FA Cup quarterfinals.

Until then some friendly fire and the framework of the Reading goal had held up United's blindside run into the quarterfinals ahead of the remaining seven ties.

United missed enough chances to maintain their record of scoring a single goal in each of their past seven games - a statistic that questions the wisdom of transferring Jan Age Fjortoft and Brian Deane, Blades strikers who had scored 25 goals between them this season.

"There's nothing like an early goal in the Cup," Nigel Spackman said without much originality before the tie, adding: "You don't see many teams losing from that situation."

Sheffield United came close to presenting their manager with such a tranquilising goal in 30 seconds. A slip by Lee Hodges led to Dean Saunders being given a clear run at the goal defended by Reading's third-choice goalkeeper, Sal Bibbo, a 23-year-old who was given a free transfer by Sheffield United two years ago. But Saunders' shot hit the crossbar and the ball was cleared.

Reading rarely threatened last night. Simon Tracey, the goalkeeper who begins a suspension today for his sending-off at Portsmouth, was hardly involved in the first half, even by Reading's three corners.

Reading encouraged the Sheffield attack with some shoddy and unorthodox defending, either retrieved by sudden heroic tackles or reprieved by the home side's inaccurate finishing. But one cleared by Martyn Booty stood out: he frustrated United at another corner by acrobatically volleying away a low cross by Taylor from the right.

The crossbar again saved Reading on the hour when Andy Bernal dived backwards in his efforts to clear a much more dangerous cross from the Greek international Vass Borbokis.