As a season ticket holder in Old Trafford’s Stretford End, I felt a little like a fish out of water at my all-girls’ school in West London. University, I thought, would offer up more football fans with whom I could bond over Match of the Day. Not so: rugby and rowing seem far more popular with the Cantabs than the beautiful game, even amongst fellow art history students. Nonetheless, as the world of the gown slept in early January, I set out to find out if football was kicking anywhere in town. Cambridge United vs. Luton Town would be an excellent introduction to my new local team. The match, however, was quite unlike the football I knew.

In art history terms, Manchester United is the High Baroque. Each match is extraordinary drama. The players are such stuff as dreams are made of: demigods dripping in riches, in whose presence one can witness history. I can say I have seen the poetry of Cristiano Ronaldo, slicing scalpel-like through helpless defences, not running, but dancing. Wayne Rooney’s overhead kick against City that drove the Reds on to win the league in 2011: I can say I was there. By comparison, there was nothing so earth-shaking at the R. Costings Abbey Stadium in Cambridge, nor did any displays of superhuman skill send shivers down my spine. If Manchester United is the bejewelled International Gothic, or Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel; then Cambridge United is folk painting. They are both art. Neither has any less beauty, or feeling, or value, but they are quite different in effect.

If most Manchester United games are monied and manicured theatrics, Cambridge vs. Luton in the third round of the FA Cup was mud, sweat and testosterone. In the intimate setting of the Abbey, I was right in the action, nearly on the pitch in the standing terrace. Up close, the tackles crunched. This was an altogether more gritty and visceral viewing experience than Old Trafford: each lashing kick made me wince. The Cambridge stadium was full of life. There was delight when Robbie Simpson sneaked the ball past the keeper, who initially saved his penalty, in the first half. The stands pulsated when Ryan Donaldson’s run from over the halfway line produced a cracking goal just after the hour. We bit our fingernails with nerves after Michael Harriman’s header earned Luton one back and the visitors pressed hard for twenty minutes until the final whistle. In the end, there were smiles all round as Cambridge progressed to the fourth round for the first time in 15 years.

One of the beautiful things about football, in my eyes, is its ability to forge new bonds (which is far more interesting than the alternative: infantile, and often violent, campanilismo). I got chatting to the friendly fans behind me: “Is it your first time here? Did you enjoy it?” Yes, after the match I felt uplifted. That was not because of the score, but because I had really watched football, without the tassels and histrionics. There was no diving or biting or product placement. This was England, united and divided by football and its rivalries; local lads watching local lads playing a good, clean game. Football is dead. Long live football.

The game runs deep in Cambridge. In 1579, after an ancient ‘footeball’ match between ‘town and gown’ concluded with a bloody brawl, the Vice Chancellor banning all students from playing outside college grounds. Football remained popular through the 19th century and the university came to shape the sport’s history. Students from various regions of the country found that they all played by different rules. In 1848, therefore, a committee led by Henry de Winton and John Charles Thring formulated a definitive guide to the game, which they nailed to a tree in Parker’s Piece. The ‘Cambridge Rules’, allowing goals kicks, throw-ins and forward passes, formed the basis of the Football Association’s new rules in 1863.

More recently, Cambridge United burst into the university ‘bubble’ in May 2014 when their victory parade passed through the centre of town. A 2-1 victory over Gateshead at Wembley had ensured the Amber Army’s promotion from the Football Conference. Back in the Football League, Cambridge are flying high and cashing in. Financial straits have been dire since the Yellows saw relegation and a brief period in administration in 2005. Though the team have enjoyed something of a resurgence since 2013, they will surely benefit from the extra funds the fourth-round tie will ensure.

Gate receipts aside, Cambridge stand to gain from television, the FA and supporters’ purchases on the day. The whole town would benefit if a Premier League outfit shipped in for the next match. The manager Richard Money agreed, telling the press, “We want the £250,000 tie. We want a big club away from home.” As fate would have it, Manchester United came out of the hat.

Now that Cambridge are back and making waves in the Football League, could these minnows become giant-killers? Regardless of the result, the game will be significant for the home team and for me. As two football worlds collide, I am not sure whose side I will be on. I go to Old Trafford to witness the Sublime, to worship at the altar of football. But from now on I think I will go to the Abbey to watch football as well.