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Time to abolish cup-tied rule
Spare a thought for cup-tied Jermain Defoe this weekend, forced to sit on the sidelines when Portsmouth play West Bromwich Albion in the FA Cup semi-final at Wembley because of an antiquated rule the authorities should consider changing.
Defoe, who joined Portsmouth from Tottenham Hotspur just before the transfer window closed on January 31, played for his old club against Reading and Manchester United in the third and fourth rounds which ruled him out of the FA Cup for the rest of the season.
He also appeared in 18 Premier League matches for Spurs — but of course is not banned from playing in the same competition for Portsmouth. (One bizarre twist in that move was that because he technically joined Portsmouth from Spurs on a loan deal which was made permanent a few days later, he was not allowed to play against Spurs two weeks ago — but that’s another matter.)
The cup-tied rule was introduced decades ago to stop clubs buying up players who could boost their chances in the later rounds of the competition.
The rule has rarely been waivered, and I can only think of one example when it was. The FA allowed Stan Crowther and Ernie Taylor to play for Manchester United in the FA Cup after the Munich air disaster in 1958 even though both were cup-tied.
But these days, with the transfer window closing at the end of January, clubs are hardly likely to buy players just for the FA Cup. They are buying them for the league.
UEFA also say players who appear for one team in the Champions League or UEFA Cup cannot play for another in the same competition in the same season. Surely though, if you are allowed to play for two clubs in the same league in the same season, logically you should be able to play for two clubs in the same cup competition? (All Things Footie thinks the away goals rule is just as daft.)
FA Cup response — How much more romantic can you get?
So Kevin Fylan has poured scorn on this season’s FA Cup, saying romance was “the last word” he would choose to describe what’s happening in the competition. Well Kev, as we prepare for this weekend’s semi-finals, let me say I couldn’t disagree more.
I’ll admit I’m something of a footballing Luddite, one of those old-fashioned fans who laments the fact that the days are gone when clubs like Derby County, Nottingham Forest, Everton and Aston Villa won league titles. The days when supporters had a genuine affinity with players. The days when Sunderland, Southampton and West Ham could win the FA Cup.
Although it’s clearly not their top priority, I simply don’t agree with the assertion that the FA Cup doesn’t matter to the Big Four. One look at the Chelsea line-up that went down at Barnsley indicates how much they were up for the Cup. Sure, they rested Frank Lampard and Petr Cech, but it was by no means wholesale squad rotation and you only had to see the look on Avram Grant’s face as he trudged down the tunnel at Oakwell to see he was far from ambivalent about his team’s cup exit.
It was a similar story with Manchester United as they were beaten by Portsmouth. Sir Alex Ferguson’s post-match rant was not the work of a man happy to be knocked out of the FA Cup.
When I was a kid the FA Cup was the pinnacle of the football season. It’s scarcely believable that until 1983 it was the only domestic match to be shown live on TV during the football season, and the media build-up to the game would last for weeks.
One of the best days of my life was the FA Cup final of 1980, when my beloved West Ham beat the favourites Arsenal 1-0 at Wembley thanks to Trevor Brooking’s header.
On May 8 in 1980, two days before the final, it was my eighth birthday. My Dad had taken my brother Bill and me to Upton Park to most home matches during the season, as well as the FA Cup semi-final against Everton, but due to a complicated voucher scheme we were only eligible for two tickets for the final and, as the youngest, I was going to have to miss out.
Totally agree mike. The only conceivable reason for keeping the rule is so that players involved through all the rounds get to win a cup and not players who just feature in the latter stages and then grab all the glory. In modern football though, this reasoning is long gone.