Tuesday night at Fratton Park was a head versus heart night. Well it was for me.
Let me explain. My head was telling me - and still is - that a Cup exit to Ipswich for Paul Cook's men at the third round replay stage was best for all concerned. It would have left us to get on with the business of getting out of League Two and would not have been, by any means, a disgraceful defeat.
And I think plenty of others had the same feeling. Before kick-off and in the early stages, it didn't feel like an FA Cup night under the Fratton lights; it didn't feel like a big game. It just felt like another game, despite the fact a healthy-sized crowd were packing into the old place.
But the trouble with football is it rarely allows the head to lead the heart. It's not a science, it's not predictable and your favourite team and players rarely do what you want them to do, or think they should.
Before kick-off I was even breaking my usual rule of never predicting a Pompey defeat. It'll be 1-0 to Ipswich, I told anyone who cared to listen, and a few who didn't.
I'd have been quite happy with us giving Big Mick McCarthy's team a good run for their money before slipping out quietly and without fuss so that thoughts of Barnet and not Bournemouth could dominate next week's thoughts and plans for players and fans alike.
Then the game started and Pompey were looking rather good, Ipswich somewhat average. They attacked, they went close, they won a penalty, they scored. In an instant, the heart took over from the head. Oh heck. This was not in the script. And there's your problem. In football, and in particular in the FA Cup, there is no script. The first anyone knows about the plot and its twists is when they happen.
From the moment Pompey went ahead, thoughts of a harmess and even a useful exit went out of the window. You might start a game not minding if Pompey lose, but you can't - well at least I can't, and nor can plenty of others - actually want them to lose once a game is under way. Certainly not in the grand old FA Cup.
By the time it was 2-0 Fratton was rocking and Ipswich were rocked. Pompey had taken a two-goal lead against a Championship club without too much trouble and suddenly the FA Cup looked like much more than a distraction once again. We were going to win and then we were going to get ready to give Bournemouth a run for their money.
Ipswich - call them Ipswich Reserves if you like, it doesn't make much difference to how much better than them Pompey were over the two games - were not great, but Cook's team looked the part, and have done now in each of the four games they have played against Championship opposition this season.
In beating Derby and Ipswich, drawing at Portman Road and only losing 2-1 to Reading after scoring first, Pompey have done the equivalent of picking up seven points from four Championship games. Stretch that form out over a 46-game season and it gives you something like 80 points. And although that's over-simplifying how the Blues might fare if picked up from League Two and plonked in the second tier in their current state, there has been enough to suggest this squad belongs at a higher level than the one at which it currently sits.
Round four and the visit of Eddie Howe's team will tell us more about how good a team we have at Fratton Park this season. It's not impossible the Cherries will win something like 5-1 - the exact score they lost by at the same stage of the Cup exactly a quarter of a century ago. But I don't think they will.
I said before the Ipswich game I fancied Town to end our run but that if we got through, I thought we could beat Bournemouth. Well I got the first forecast wrong, but remain confident about the second.
As for the issue of whether the Cup run is bad for our league hopes, I don't think that necessarily follows. Of course we don't want to end up with too many weeks containing Saturday-Tuesday-Saturday league action , but we're nothing like at that stage yet.
Only if a Cup game led to a key player being injured and ruled out of a significant portion of the run-in would damage to the promotion bid be possible to blame on the inability or unwillingness to lose at an earlier stage.
And be honest. When past-his-best Brett Pitman tried (and failed) to bully Adam Webster down by the Fratton end touchline in the first half, were you really ready to accept an Ipswich win? Or did you decide you'd rather Pompey went on to register their first home win over the Tractor Boys for 50 years, and their first FA Cup win over a team from two leagues higher for 107 years?
Because I don't think I was the only Blues fan who started the night not being bothered about the Cup but ended it being inspired once more by it and desperate to get my hands on a ticket for round four. A trip to Barnet, important though it remains, can wait.
Follow Steve Bone on Twitter - @stevebone1
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