roker report 
24-04-2024 05:56
24-04-2024 05:56
Sunderland have often benefited from FA Cup replays, so is scrapping them the wrong decision?
Last week, it was announced that the FA will scrap replays as part of their flagship cup competition for the 2024/2025 season.
They stated that this measure was discussed with both the Premier League and the EFL for ‘well over a year’ and reiterated that all parties involved agreed that ‘they (replays) couldn’t continue.’
FA statement on changes to the Emirates FA Cup — Emirates FA Cup (@EmiratesFACup) April 19, 2024
However, the response from multiple EFL sides and the league board itself suggests otherwise.
At the time of writing, Tranmere, Plymouth, Exeter, Peterborough and AFC Wimbledon, among a swathe of other clubs, have all released impassioned statements voicing their dissatisfaction, so what does this mean for Sunderland and the wider EFL?
First and foremost, the ‘agreement’ seems to have been made solely between the Premier League and the governing body, and the statement reveals as much, saying that the ‘FA and the Premier League have reached a new agreement’ without mentioning the Championship or Leagues One and Two.
The Premier League have been gunning for something like this for a while, and I’ve lost count of how many times managers including Jurgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola have pleaded for the calendar to be changed in order to give their players a break. The matter of player welfare is a pressing one, and it’s certainly transferable to the EFL.
Larger leagues mean more games, especially with potential cup runs, but top flight clubs make a mockery of this argument when they arrange friendly matches almost as soon as the season finishes.
Tottenham Hotspur and Newcastle United, for example, are pencilled in for a friendly game in Melbourne just three days after the season ends, and although other clubs may not be playing as soon as three days later, they’ll be playing shortly afterwards. It just goes to show that player welfare goes out of the window when big clubs catch a sniff of a profit.
This also serves as a timely reminder that the English football hierarchy is heavily geared towards fulfilling the wishes of the ‘big boys’. It’s also important to consider that this news comes around the same time that the Premier League has stalled on talks of a funding deal.
Eliminating FA Cup replays seems to be just another way of consolidating the footballing hierarchy, with the Premier League getting what they want and clubs such as Sunderland left wanting.
Power and money aside, there’s an argument that the decision diminishes the magic of the world’s oldest domestic cup competition.
The ‘magic of the cup’ relies on giving smaller clubs the chance to make a name for themselves, and what better way of doing so than taking a team leagues above you to a replay?
The result often means very little, but the national fame you acquire by shocking a bigger club is more important, not to mention the fact that the replay opens up the possibility of much-needed revenue.
As an example, think of Exeter City and the replay that kept their club alive in 2005. It helped the club, then under supporter-led ownership, to clear its debts. Closer to home, it’s a well-known fact that neither of Sunderland’s two FA Cup wins could’ve been achieved without replays.
We won the competition for the first time in 1937, but we needed three replays along the way, and one of these occurred in the fourth round proper against Luton Town, as having drawn 2-2 in Luton, we won the return leg at Roker Park four days later.
The next replay(s) came in the fifth round, as we faced a Wolves team in good form.
Wolves had played five cup games, including two replays, and had scored six goals in two of those five ties. We eventually needed two replays to finally beat them- once again at home, where we scored four in a thrashing.
This set up a semi-final tie against Millwall, before an eventual final against Preston North End, and the rest was history. Thirty six years later, the cup run of 1972/1973 was a little different, yet it can be argued that replays were even more important.
Then in the second tier, we needed two bites of the cherry in every round we appeared in, with the exception of the the semi-final and the final. Along the way, we replayed a third round tie at Notts County, a fourth round tie at home to Reading, and a fifth round tie at First Division Manchester City.
The cup final of 1973 made Sunderland the first Second Division side to win the tournament in forty two years, but without the replays, there’s every chance we wouldn’t have.
Scrapping replays could make stories such as ours less likely, as we repeatedly earned ourselves a second crack, with five games played at Roker Park. Indeed, if home advantage meant nothing, the ability to recover after each tie and get a result in the next surely played some part. It’s undeniable that replays have their drawbacks.
All footballers have incredibly busy calendars, but is getting rid of a century-old tradition really the answer?
There’s an argument that replays can congest the calendar and that getting rid of them is the only solution the FA feel is viable, yet with their removal comes a great sense of sadness.
That sadness will be largely nostalgic as opposed to logical, because it does make more sense to condense a result into one game, but football is all about nostalgia, as we love looking back at our history.
From the quirky replays that went on and on, to winning cup finals, it’s all part of the heritage of the game. As we prepare to turn the page on cup replays, it marks the end of a great footballing chapter.
They stated that this measure was discussed with both the Premier League and the EFL for ‘well over a year’ and reiterated that all parties involved agreed that ‘they (replays) couldn’t continue.’
FA statement on changes to the Emirates FA Cup — Emirates FA Cup (@EmiratesFACup) April 19, 2024
However, the response from multiple EFL sides and the league board itself suggests otherwise.
At the time of writing, Tranmere, Plymouth, Exeter, Peterborough and AFC Wimbledon, among a swathe of other clubs, have all released impassioned statements voicing their dissatisfaction, so what does this mean for Sunderland and the wider EFL?
First and foremost, the ‘agreement’ seems to have been made solely between the Premier League and the governing body, and the statement reveals as much, saying that the ‘FA and the Premier League have reached a new agreement’ without mentioning the Championship or Leagues One and Two.
The Premier League have been gunning for something like this for a while, and I’ve lost count of how many times managers including Jurgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola have pleaded for the calendar to be changed in order to give their players a break. The matter of player welfare is a pressing one, and it’s certainly transferable to the EFL.
Larger leagues mean more games, especially with potential cup runs, but top flight clubs make a mockery of this argument when they arrange friendly matches almost as soon as the season finishes.
Tottenham Hotspur and Newcastle United, for example, are pencilled in for a friendly game in Melbourne just three days after the season ends, and although other clubs may not be playing as soon as three days later, they’ll be playing shortly afterwards. It just goes to show that player welfare goes out of the window when big clubs catch a sniff of a profit.
This also serves as a timely reminder that the English football hierarchy is heavily geared towards fulfilling the wishes of the ‘big boys’. It’s also important to consider that this news comes around the same time that the Premier League has stalled on talks of a funding deal.
Eliminating FA Cup replays seems to be just another way of consolidating the footballing hierarchy, with the Premier League getting what they want and clubs such as Sunderland left wanting.
Power and money aside, there’s an argument that the decision diminishes the magic of the world’s oldest domestic cup competition.
The ‘magic of the cup’ relies on giving smaller clubs the chance to make a name for themselves, and what better way of doing so than taking a team leagues above you to a replay?
The result often means very little, but the national fame you acquire by shocking a bigger club is more important, not to mention the fact that the replay opens up the possibility of much-needed revenue.
As an example, think of Exeter City and the replay that kept their club alive in 2005. It helped the club, then under supporter-led ownership, to clear its debts. Closer to home, it’s a well-known fact that neither of Sunderland’s two FA Cup wins could’ve been achieved without replays.
We won the competition for the first time in 1937, but we needed three replays along the way, and one of these occurred in the fourth round proper against Luton Town, as having drawn 2-2 in Luton, we won the return leg at Roker Park four days later.
The next replay(s) came in the fifth round, as we faced a Wolves team in good form.
Wolves had played five cup games, including two replays, and had scored six goals in two of those five ties. We eventually needed two replays to finally beat them- once again at home, where we scored four in a thrashing.
This set up a semi-final tie against Millwall, before an eventual final against Preston North End, and the rest was history. Thirty six years later, the cup run of 1972/1973 was a little different, yet it can be argued that replays were even more important.
Then in the second tier, we needed two bites of the cherry in every round we appeared in, with the exception of the the semi-final and the final. Along the way, we replayed a third round tie at Notts County, a fourth round tie at home to Reading, and a fifth round tie at First Division Manchester City.
The cup final of 1973 made Sunderland the first Second Division side to win the tournament in forty two years, but without the replays, there’s every chance we wouldn’t have.
Scrapping replays could make stories such as ours less likely, as we repeatedly earned ourselves a second crack, with five games played at Roker Park. Indeed, if home advantage meant nothing, the ability to recover after each tie and get a result in the next surely played some part. It’s undeniable that replays have their drawbacks.
All footballers have incredibly busy calendars, but is getting rid of a century-old tradition really the answer?
There’s an argument that replays can congest the calendar and that getting rid of them is the only solution the FA feel is viable, yet with their removal comes a great sense of sadness.
That sadness will be largely nostalgic as opposed to logical, because it does make more sense to condense a result into one game, but football is all about nostalgia, as we love looking back at our history.
From the quirky replays that went on and on, to winning cup finals, it’s all part of the heritage of the game. As we prepare to turn the page on cup replays, it marks the end of a great footballing chapter.