If the FA doesn't care about the FA Cup, why should we?

The scrapping of replays in the FA Cup from the First Round on had an entirely predictable effect, and to the near-exclusive detriment of the non-league clubs involved.

It’s almost as though it was entirely predictable. The first round of First Round FA Cup matches without replays came about last weekend, and it is extremely obvious that the change to the rule, which was first announced in April, has significantly benefitted EFL clubs over non-league clubs at this stage of the competition.

Three of the matches between EFL and non-league clubs went to penalty shootouts, and all three of those were won by the EFL clubs. In total, six went at least to extra-time and of those, five were won by the EFL club, with only Kettering Town’s 2-1 win at Northampton Town bucking this trend.

This shouldn’t be surprising. Even though the lines between what constitutes ‘professional’ and ‘semi-professional’ in football are more blurred than ever these days, clubs higher up the ladder should have better and—crucially—fitter players. Anyone who’s ever played extra-time at the end of a match will already know how both mentally and physically just an extra thirty minutes can be. That a gap should open up during those additional thirty minutes is absolutely not a surprise.

Of course, there’s a financial side to this as well. Guiseley, of the Northern Premier League, held Stevenage to a 1-1 draw after 120 minutes at Broadhall Way on Saturday afternoon before finally succumbing 5-4 after a penalty shootout. They’ve estimated that they would have made in the region of £50,000 from a replay. As such, all they’ve been left with is a feeling that they’ll never know what might have happened, had they been given a second chance on home territory.

They weren’t the only club to find themselves in this position. Weston-super-Mare, of the National League South, were level at 90 minutes against Bristol Rovers. Considering the relative proximity of these two clubs, a replay would have been very valuable to them. Instead, they lost 3-1 after extra-time and have little show for their trip but pride in their performance.

Something approaching the inverse could also be argued to be true for those non-league clubs who were drawn at home. Southend United, of the National League, lost 4-3 after extra-time to Charlton. With gate receipts split between the two clubs and the possibility of television coverage, they could have earned themselves a tidy, if not earth-shattering, amount from a replay.

The FA had cited the expansion of UEFA’ club competitions and the resulting strain on the domestic football calendar as reasons for the change when introducing the ban in April, to which perhaps the only rational answer is, “Okay, but what’s that got to do with clubs in League One, League Two, and in the non-league game?”

None of these clubs are playing European football. True enough, most of them have punishing 46-match seasons, but then that’s been the case for decades, and anyway, that wasn’t the reason given. The reason given was a stupid one, which didn’t make any sense in the context of the actual teams that were taking part. 

The Guiseley general manager James Pickles didn’t hold back after the Stevenage game, telling the PA news agency that, “I think replays have been scrapped to benefit seven clubs, if we’re all honest. No, probably not even that – probably four clubs. And there are thousands of clubs who enter the FA Cup.”

And that really is the crux of what has happened. In essence, the non-league game—as well as, later in the competition, potentially smaller EFL clubs—has been shafted for the benefit of some of the wealthiest clubs in world football. Add the ridiculous National League Cup, which appears to have been introduced at the behest of the Premier League for the benefit of their academies—to this, and you get some idea of where the current round of reforms of English football has been headed for a while. Take from the poor and give to the rich, ultimately.

This constant devaluation of the world’s oldest football competition by the people running it has knock-on effects. Regular readers to this site may recall that I did a match from every round of last year’s FA Cup from the Extra Preliminary Round at the end of July to the Third Round in January. I didn’t bother this year, instead dipping out of the qualifying round matches if there was anything of interest to me, which there largely wasn’t. If the FA itself cares so little about smaller clubs in the FA Cup, then why should I care about it?

Small wonder crowds in the latter stages of the competition have been atrophying for years. Perhaps all that’s happening here is that the rot that has been evident in the latter stages of the competition is just spreading back to its earlier stages as well now. Because if the FA Cup is going to tilt all of its attention towards the richest clubs and be squeezed for smaller clubs in this way, then why, exactly, should we bother?

And the fact of the matter is that the financial aspect also matters. It is absolutely fair to say that this form of lottery in which a club could, with a decent run and favourable draws, make a seven-figure sum, is far from an ideal way of redistributing money down the pyramid, but it was what we have and now it’s being kicked away, and with entirely predictable results. But then again, it does feel rather as though the FA would prefer entirely predictable results in semi-finals and a final with ‘narrative’. It’s the most rational way to explain a decision, the effects of which were so easy to foresee.

There were a couple of surprise results over the weekend. Tamworth beat Huddersfield Town on Friday night. Kettering’s extra-time win at Northampton held extra significance because it was a local derby. Wealdstone won at Grimsby. But the draw for the Second Round has thrown up no all-non-league matches at all. Add the abandonment of replays to this, and it’s far from implausible that there could be no non-league clubs at all in the Third Round of this year’s FA Cup.

The FA changed the format of the Cup in 1925 to what it effectively remains to this day, with four qualifying rounds before the First Round Proper. Since then, there has only been one season—1950/51—when no non-league sides made it as far as the Third Round, when the biggest clubs join. When Eastleigh were the only non-league representative at that stage in 2015/16, it was the first time that only one had made it that far since 1968/69. In other words, should one or no non-league clubs progress to the Third Round this year, it would be highly anomalous.

The Second Round draw has thrown up some interesting matches, but when the enthusiasm wanes, it can be difficult for it to return. How many non-league clubs will be looking at the FA Cup with a little less interest next season? How many supporters might, if they feel the scales have been too unfairly weighed against them?

And, if it has to be this way and non-league clubs are to be marginalised from it while it’s at best only third or fourth on the priority list of the very clubs that the FA has distorted this competition beyond recognition over, what actually is the point of the FA Cup? It’s a question that many of us probably never thought we’d be asking, but that’s modern football for you.