Bristol City host Manchester United and Arsenal paired with West Ham in farcical Carabao Cup draw

That just about wraps up our coverage of this afternoon's calamity, thanks for sticking with us.

I will be back on Saturday to bring you live coverage of a busy seven-strong slate of Premier League games that includes Manchester United vs Tottenham, Arsenal vs Swansea, Liverpool vs Huddersfield, West Brom vs Manchester City and Bournemouth vs Chelsea.

Until then, it's goodbye.

A reminder that those quarter-final fixtures will take place during the week commencing 18 December.

Thank goodness that's now all over and done with. An utter shambles.

A London derby between Arsenal and West Ham is probably the pick of the ties, while Bristol City will relish a massive test against Manchester United at Ashton Gate.

Bristol City vs Manchester United

Leicester vs Manchester City

Arsenal vs West Ham

Chelsea vs Bournemouth

The draw has been pre-recorded...

Thanks to my colleague Tony Mogan, who certainly did not envisage that this farce of a draw would still not be completed by the end of his shift.

Still the wait goes on. Absolutely ridiculous.

Still no indication as to when this draw will take place. Cancel it. The whole competition. Try again next year. Let's all move on with our lives.

Imagine the Twitter meltdown when after all this, Manchester United get a cushy home tie against Bristol City.

Eight teams. Four ties. One hat. An hour and 20 minutes later, and we are still waiting.

Just give it to Red Bull until the end of the season so we can all go home.

UPDATE

And here come the memes.

We are about five minutes away from bringing you the most pointless endeavour in the history of cup competition; predicting the draw ourselves.

Please, Carabao and Twitter, for all that is good and holy, don't let it come to this.

Why can't someone just Periscope this from their phone?

At the risk of sounding ridiculously optimistic, we should be underway any minute now...

Any respect the Milk Cup/Littlewoods Challenge Cup, Rumbelows Cup/Worthington Cup/Carling Cup/Carabao Cup has surely been lost now. A dark day for the competition.

Right, hopefully this time are are actually just 10 minutes away from the draw starting. Phil Tufnell and Matt Dawson have a lot to answer for here...

Plenty of time now, boys.

The Carabao Cup already has a proud history of farcical draws.

Round 1: Millions tuned into see Charlton Athletic drawn twice in the ceremony held in Bangkok.

Round 2: The needless introduction of a third set of balls to determine whether seeded teams played home or away added to the fun, with poor John Salako left baffled by the change in the Sky Sports studio that afternoon. He wasn't the only one, cuing plenty of inter-club banter on Twitter.

Round three: After that debacle, why not move the entire thing to Beijing and hold it at quarter past 4 in the morning? That's what Carabao did, with millions waking up in the morning having completely forgotten the competition had existed.

DRAW DELAYED UNTIL 5PM. SCENES.

We are extremely sceptical, lads.

After Tuesday night, I'm someone out there is making a joke about Pep Guardiola complaining about the balls used in this draw as the reason for this delay. Not us, mind.

There's an unspecified delay to the proceedings here. Carabao will be FUMING.

Just a couple of minutes away from the draw now. Question of Sport veterans Phil Tufnell and Matt Dawson are being wheeled out to guide us through the arduous process of pulling eight balls out of an oversized basin.

These quarter-final ties will be one-legged affairs taking place during the week commencing 18 December. So unless the EFL decides to drastically change their formula, expect the ties to take place on Tuesday 19 December and Wednesday 20 December.

Bristol City are the only side outside of the Premier League remaining in the competition after condemning Crystal Palace to a 4-1 defeat at Ashton Gate - despite trailing to Roy Hodgson's side after 21 minutes.

Callum Wilson meanwhile came back from injury on Tuesday to inspire Bournemouth to victory over Middlesbrough, while Leicester City, having toppled Liverpool in the third round, ended Leeds United's cup run at the King Power Stadium.

Manchester United and Chelsea meanwhile had slightly more straight-forward evenings this week. A superb brace from Jesse Lingard eased Jose Mourinho's side past Swansea City at the Liberty Stadium, a result that didn't quite erase the memories of last Saturday's defeat to Huddersfield but certainly left the manager in a slightly better mood.

The Premier League champions meanwhile saw off an Everton side lead by David Unsworth for the first time thanks to goals from Antonio Rudiger and Willian - with Danny Drinkwater makes his belated Blues debut.

Both Arsenal and Manchester City had to do things the hard way in their fourth-round fixtures at home to Championship opposition. After falling behind to Norwich City, 18-year-old Eddie Nketiah scored an equaliser 15 seconds after coming off the bench for his senior Gunners debut, adding a second six minutes into extra-time to guide his side into the stage.

Man City meanwhile laboured at home to Wolves, who denied Pep Guardiola's side during a crazy 120 minutes where they also passed up their own opportunities to cause the shock of the round. Two saves from Claudio Bravo in a deciding penalty shoot-out however saw the Premier League side see off the opposition.

Tottenham Hotspur probably thought their name was already in the hat for the draw at half-time at Wembley on Wednesday night. But a stunning comeback from West Ham United saw the Hammers come from two goals behind to seal a memorable 3-2 win over their London rivals, a result that handed under-fire manager Slaven Bilic a much needed reprieve.

Here are the numbers to look out for this afternoon's draw.

We are down to the final eight teams in the race for the first piece of silverware of the season. Jose Mourinho has his eye on winning this competition for a fifth time after last season's success, but with Arsenal and Manchester City surviving fourth-round scares and with Chelsea still in the mix, booking a spot in the semi-final will not be easy.

Stick with us, the draw itself is scheduled to get underway at 4pm.