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The FA Cup reaction


WhiskeyJar
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54 minutes ago, magicrat said:

My take on the decline of domestic cups is that it is largely the effect of having so many foreign coaches and star players. They want to come to the big teams here to get international recognition and have not grown up with traditions and history of the FA cup. 

Sorry, can't let that slide without a rebuttal. Not having a go, but I've seen this view spouted by pundits and lower league bods a few times, and in my opinion it's mistaking correlation for causation.

 

The decline of the FA Cup has coincided with an increase in foreign influence - players, coaches and owners - in the English game, but the root causes lie elsewhere. 

 

The main spoils of the English game used to be the league title and the FA Cup, with a brief jaunt into European knockout competition as a luxury afforded to a select few. The money and prestige from the FA Cup was therefore prominent. As English sides started winning European Cups regularly, I'd argue the FA Cup had already begun the first stages of its slow demotion - as a greater prize was now achievable -  and this would only really be abated in the period post-Heysel where it regained top two billing.

 

However, the Premier League era, with the massive inflation in broadcast revenue turned domestic cup participation into something that needed to be weighed against survival in the league, hence clubs sitting towards the bottom of the table starting to risk fielding weaker teams. They'd be stocked with English players, English managers, but still facing a dilemma that no attachment to a sense of whimsical magic could alleviate. The money in the league meant regaining your place at the top table would become even harder than it had ever been. Get off the gravy train, and you may never get back on.

 

Alongside this shift, came the expanded Champions League format, which offered both a greater workload, and a huge monetary incentive to the sides towards the top of the league. As such, they too would start fielding weaker teams as a calculated risk. The best players wanted a CL side, those sides had the best chance of winning the league, so things like mid-week replays in domestic competitions were pushed down the list of priorities. Most football clubs either planning or worried about the future are always looking upwards or downwards, and domestic cups became more of a lateral concern, a bonus for those who get near the latter rounds.

 

This squeezing from top and bottom is what lead to the idea that only plucky mid-table - salt of the earth, English managers etc. - sides take it seriously; they do so because they don't face the potential to lose their position, either financially, or the players associated with their status.

 

I'd argue there was a resurgence of a golden period for the FA Cup during the PL era, when English sides were shite in Europe. But, as one competition gains prominence and its prize attainability, the other inevitably slides into the background.

 

Lower league sides, where the potential to go one round further, and maybe draw a big club, put in the effort because they don't get regular television or gate revenue of that magnitude, or the associated cache of playing a big side weekly, so it becomes important to them. It's a day in front of the cameras, their Rocky moment, and a free hit. This has been rebranded as "the magic of the cup", but in reality it's little more than the British obsession with the plucky underdog story. 

 

For the record, I'd love us to win the FA Cup, as I still want it to be a showcase event for the best of domestic football. I know, however, that it's now a faded star - the silent actress trying to feign relevance in the talky era - ignored by top directors and desperate to claim top billing again. If the FA want it to be what it once was, they need to consider the steps necessary to make it appealing to the best sides; it may sound arrogant and elitist, but in every sport it's the participation of the best that make a competition relevant. And, whilst we've got the two best coaches in world football in our league, I'd take their comments seriously rather than intimating they simply don't understand its magic.

 

Apologies for the long post.

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54 minutes ago, Babb'sBurstNad said:

Sorry, can't let that slide without a rebuttal. Not having a go, but I've seen this view spouted by pundits and lower league bods a few times, and in my opinion it's mistaking correlation for causation.

 

The decline of the FA Cup has coincided with an increase in foreign influence - players, coaches and owners - in the English game, but the root causes lie elsewhere. 

 

The main spoils of the English game used to be the league title and the FA Cup, with a brief jaunt into European knockout competition as a luxury afforded to a select few. The money and prestige from the FA Cup was therefore prominent. As English sides started winning European Cups regularly, I'd argue the FA Cup had already begun the first stages of its slow demotion - as a greater prize was now achievable -  and this would only really be abated in the period post-Heysel where it regained top two billing.

 

However, the Premier League era, with the massive inflation in broadcast revenue turned domestic cup participation into something that needed to be weighed against survival in the league, hence clubs sitting towards the bottom of the table starting to risk fielding weaker teams. They'd be stocked with English players, English managers, but still facing a dilemma that no attachment to a sense of whimsical magic could alleviate. The money in the league meant regaining your place at the top table would become even harder than it had ever been. Get off the gravy train, and you may never get back on.

 

Alongside this shift, came the expanded Champions League format, which offered both a greater workload, and a huge monetary incentive to the sides towards the top of the league. As such, they too would start fielding weaker teams as a calculated risk. The best players wanted a CL side, those sides had the best chance of winning the league, so things like mid-week replays in domestic competitions were pushed down the list of priorities. Most football clubs either planning or worried about the future are always looking upwards or downwards, and domestic cups became more of a lateral concern, a bonus for those who get near the latter rounds.

 

This squeezing from top and bottom is what lead to the idea that only plucky mid-table - salt of the earth, English managers etc. - sides take it seriously; they do so because they don't face the potential to lose their position, either financially, or the players associated with their status.

 

I'd argue there was a resurgence of a golden period for the FA Cup during the PL era, when English sides were shite in Europe. But, as one competition gains prominence and its prize attainability, the other inevitably slides into the background.

 

Lower league sides, where the potential to go one round further, and maybe draw a big club, put in the effort because they don't get regular television or gate revenue of that magnitude, or the associated cache of playing a big side weekly, so it becomes important to them. It's a day in front of the cameras, their Rocky moment, and a free hit. This has been rebranded as "the magic of the cup", but in reality it's little more than the British obsession with the plucky underdog story. 

 

For the record, I'd love us to win the FA Cup, as I still want it to be a showcase event for the best of domestic football. I know, however, that it's now a faded star - the silent actress trying to feign relevance in the talky era - ignored by top directors and desperate to claim top billing again. If the FA want it to be what it once was, they need to consider the steps necessary to make it appealing to the best sides; it may sound arrogant and elitist, but in every sport it's the participation of the best that make a competition relevant. And, whilst we've got the two best coaches in world football in our league, I'd take their comments seriously rather than intimating they simply don't understand its magic.

 

Apologies for the long post.

Some very good points I concede.  Like most things the cause and the effect are never simple. Without doubt a combination of factors have led us to where we are but I think we all agree the genie aint getting back in the bottle.

 

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The FA (and the Football League) have done nothing to preserve or maintain the value/prestige of the Cup either.

 

Indeed, they've neither modernised it to save it, nor held on to traditions to save it....

 

An example of modernisation: giving Shrewsbury the option of a big and romantic payday by switching an initial home tie to Anfield.  Alternatively, if Shrewsbury choose to stay at home... then they go to ET and pens there and then.

 

And obversely, letting tradition slip: semi-finals moved to Wembley.  Final time switched from the wonderful 3pm time slot.  Man Utd not even participating once.

 

In other words, they've done fuck-all: neither maintain properly, nor renovate properly.

 

Comparatively, it has nothing to do with foreign influence trumping English (one of the best finals was the "Argentine" replay of 1981 - Ossie's going to Wembley, his knees have gone all trembly... la-la la-la, la-la la-la)

 

The people that run the fucking show continue to be complacent, contradictory, establishment hypocrites.

 

 

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5 hours ago, skaro said:

The people that run the fucking show continue to be complacent, contradictory, establishment hypocrites.

 

 


But complacent, contradictory, establishment hypocrites who take their 10% of the gate money for each game. Replays included. Hmmmm, can there possibly be some correlation between keeping replays and 10%.....

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9 hours ago, Jarvinja Ilnow said:

 

In no time, other fans will be singing "in your Liverpool slums" and "you'll never work again" et al. I thought we'd all moved on from these stereotypes: it's been great to live in enlightened times,free from those chants, and I'd hate to see those dark days ever come back. Can anyone think back and remember those days when fans used to sing "feed the Scousers, let them know it's Christmas time?"

 

 

What are you talking about? 

They've never stopped singing that shit.

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Anyway, the FA opinion on anything is irrelevant. In fact I'd go as far as to say that if you agree with the FA on anything then you're probably in the region of 99.9% likely to be in the wrong, with a 0.1 percent margin of error.

 

This is an organisation that banned Suarez on a he-said she-said basis with no evidence either way, then banned John Terry for being racist despite the fact a criminal court said there was insufficient evidence. Yes I am aware that John Terry is a massive cock womble but the point stands. All done on the basis that apparently any "reference to race or colour", if I am remembering the wording correctly, is completely unacceptable, but then conveniently ignored Rio Ferdinand calling Glen Johnson a choc-ice because he defended Suarez. And also has form for ignoring the booing of John Barnes, doesn't give a shit about people referring to race if it's a bunch of knob heads singing about German bombers etc.

 

They apply rules and spout about traditions when it suits them, or pay lip service to them but ultimately when it comes down to it they would then sell their own grannies if the price was right. They can get to fuck with their bullshit frankly. 

 

For fucks sake, this is an organisation who think Gareth Southgate is a competent manager!

 

 

Edit: Oh if all of these journalists and people from lower league clubs are so bothered about the cup and the fans. When are they going to start hounding the FA for the fact that something like 1/3 of the final tickets go to corporates rather than fans of the clubs involved. Or does that not fuck with tradition and the "magic of the cup".

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23 hours ago, AngryofTuebrook said:

Not really "just another fan" - she does a bit of media work, like co-hosting a phone-in with Robbie Savage.

If you are comparing her to Robbie Savage then she is just another fan,whose job happens to work in the media. I still think that by now anybody who uses twitter should know exactly what to expect when they put an opinion on it,on anything.

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1 hour ago, Anubis said:


But complacent, contradictory, establishment hypocrites who take their 10% of the gate money for each game. Replays included. Hmmmm, can there possibly be some correlation between keeping replays and 10%.....

 

You're right.

 

I was stating the obvious.

 

 

 

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