Famous 5ive: Magic of the Cup

Third Round weekend is meant to be special, but is that still the case? Here are five potential ways to help bring back the magic of the cup when ultimately money talks  

How to solve a problem like the FA Cup? Third Round weekend in the world’s oldest club knock out competition is held up as one of the highlights of the football calendar and yet, as we sit here at the very beginning of 2013, and as the years have passed the legendary ‘romance of the cup’ seems to have drifted away. Like the passion in a loveless relationship. It can still excite from time to time, like non league Macclesfield and Luton knocking out Championship Cardiff and Wolves very recently but for many, the old tournament is showing signs of wear and tear.

It shouldn’t be this way, but for managers, players and increasingly fans, the FA Cup just simply isn’t the draw that it used to be. The focus is the Premier League, and on top of that the Champions League. For clubs at the top of English football’s pyramid, the FA Cup is way down on the list of priorities. Challenging for the title and most importantly qualification for Europe’s premier tournament is the be all and end all. The top of the pile is almost a closed shop and yet as you go down the league, interest in the FA Cup doesn’t seem to increase. For many, progress through the rounds is a distraction; all resources should be directed to staying in the top flight.

Even dropping out of the highest tier, the reputation of the good old cup has taken a battering from the fact that Championship teams also show it contempt. League leaders Cardiff City’s demise at Macclesfield came following eleven changes from the strongest team they put out in the league. The inference was clear; the FA Cup was a distraction that could be done without when the ultimate goal of Premier League football is a higher reward.

With the diminishing desire from teams and supporters alike, is it any wonder that crowds have fallen for cup ties and general interest has waned? The Champions League is where the top teams want to be, and the sad fact is that the focus of top four qualification is now valued higher than winning a trophy. Martin Samuel of the Daily Mail has often joked that the administrators and executives at clubs should take to booking an open top bus parade with one of those over sized novelty cheques, representing the money that comes from UEFA.

Players as well see the Premier League and then European football as the target. It’s no coincidence that since globalisation has hit the English game and there has been an influx of signings from all over the globe, there aren't as many at clubs born and raised on Ronnie Radford scoring for Hereford or Dave Beasant’s penalty save from John Aldridge. In countries across Europe and the world, domestic cup competitions have never had the prestige attached to them that the FA Cup has. Perhaps those playing the game no longer hold it as dear as their predecessors did.

With managers, executives and players all putting less emphasis on taking part, it follows that fan interest has taken a hit. There has been a reaction in recent years to this thinking with many supporters keen to stress that the glory of the game needs to be reclaimed. Some fans of clubs such as Arsenal and Liverpool have been trying to get the message out there to their team's wider fan base and perhaps board members, that the reason you begin to support a team when you're a child is not to celebrate being fourth best at something.

While that may be true for some fans, it’s hard to deny that the lustre of the Football Association Cup has been increasingly lost and that its reputation and standing is far from what it was when the final was the most watched football moment of the year. But is this an irreversible trend? Can the FA Cup be saved, placed back atop the game and a prize to be highly coveted rather than a consolation trinket? The focus and media glare, not to mention financial riches from the all conquering Premier and Champions Leagues would seem to suggest that those particular genies are out of the bottle, however that is not to say that with some slight modifications the FA Cup couldn’t fight back.

With that in mind, here are five suggestions that have been talked about in recent times that might, just might have an affect...

1. A Champions League place for people who’ve actually won something

As any parent might tell you the offer of rewards for doing well is a considerable carrot, and dangling the ultimate motivation in the form of a place in the Champions League might just be enough to convince managers that the FA Cup was something worth bothering about. The ‘Champions’ League maybe something of an oxymoron with English football currently having four places up for grabs but those four slots are what teams up and down the land covet more than any other. In days of yore, victory in the Cup final was the entire prize one could ever want but on top of that, if life couldn’t get any better, there was a place in the now defunct Cup Winners Cup. These days it’s a slot in the much maligned Europa League, which isn’t quite the temptation that prompts managers to go all out for FA Cup glory.

Offering up a Champions League place for the winner would renew people’s focus and unquestionably offer people a prize that they could truly get excited by. You’d be unlikely to see any weakened teams from the likes of Arsene Wenger and Sir Alex then.

Before even getting into a detailed understanding of UEFA coefficients and the fact that in the future four slots could conceivably go down to three, the Premier League calls the shots in English football and it wouldn’t be happy giving up its grip on the entry route into the European Cup. Similarly the clubs with clout would be unlikely to give up their vice like grip on the top spots. Across 38 games it’s hard for a team outside the elite to break in but in a crazy knockout tournament? Anything goes. Maybe that’s only fair... but then isn’t that what the magic of the cup is all about; you don’t have to be the biggest or the best to triumph.                

2. The games about glory

As has been highlighted It’s not just the top teams that have shunned the FA Cup in recent times, managers all the way down the league have shown it a cold shoulder, preferring the embrace of Premier League survival to a day out at Wembley (although as we’ll come to, you can get that by getting to the semi’s as well). It again comes down to reward; by staying in the top flight you earn way more money than through winning the FA Cup, and the money, well that’s what’s important right?

Should you really need to bribe people into wanting to win a trophy? I hope not but simply upping the prize money doesn’t seem the most sustainable option and it would have to be to frankly ludicrous levels to be able to compete with the riches on offer from the leagues television contract.

For teams such as Newcastle, Everton, Aston Villa, West Ham or Stoke, there is little chance of winning the league title, but with a cup competition there is always a chance to have a day in the sun. This is what managers need to remember, the game is about glory not dreams of finishing fourth. It’s not as if you can pass legislation to make this happen but maybe as fans we can try our damndest to make it known that this is what we’d prefer.  

3. One shot to make it happen

Before we come over sounding all Eminem from 8 Mile here, it’s often said of a game; “it’s being played like a cup tie”. Over the course of a marathon like season, a draw can often be a good result, play for a point and look to long term goals, but cup ties have that advantage of being a one off, an all or nothing shot to glory. Currently the FA Cup gives its competitors one more chance (although no longer in the semis and the final) but removing this insurance might just encourage managers to cut loose that little bit more. It’s not an exact science, when the powers that be tried to liven things up with a golden goal it resulted in teams that feared to lose more than they dared to win but in the long run, it might lead to teams just going for it without the safety net. At the very least it would mean fewer games for those people that like to moan about the number of matches played in this country.        

4. Home advantage for underdogs

One of the charms of the Cup is that you see highly paid names with big reputations forced to ‘slum it’ on potato patch pitches and in grounds made up of little more than a pair of bike sheds and a clubhouse. In these days of ultra modern sleek stadiums and bowling green surfaces the home advantage of a tight little ground, enclosed by a baying public can be the great leveller. In France when sides are drawn together in the cup it is the lower ranked team that automatically gets home advantage. I’m not throwing any stats out there but this clearly gives David that shot in the arm when it comes to toppling Goliath. Upsets and giant killing is what makes the cup competitions what they are and in France there have been some unbelievable, ‘Holloywoodesque’ stories of part time teams reaching finals.

That’s the sort of drama the FA Cup should want a huge piece off. The problem once again comes down to money however, teams wishing for that away draw or indeed even seeking to get a tie moved so as to get their hands on greater gate receipts. The cup needs to remember underdog success rather than playing for the money.    

5. Keep Wembley special

Wembley used to be a special place, one which it was hard work to get to. Now you can go and see monster trucks or even worse Coldplay. In the past, getting to a cup final meant the reward of going to the national stadium, an iconic monument of English football, but now, given the vast cost of Wembley’s redevelopment any opportunity to make some money back has had to be seized. The result has been playing the semi-finals there too, whereas in times gone by that meant trips to the likes of Villa Park and Old Trafford. The FA Cup needs to be made special again so to help that lets make getting to Wembley special like it used to be; finalists invited only.