I don't agree that it's guarenteed success mate. It's almost guaranteed though.
- Status
I don't agree that it's guarenteed success mate. It's almost guaranteed though.
johnnydawg68
Chairperson, People's Front of Saint Domingo
If we don't take this chance, I'm not sure another one will come for a while. My opinion only course, but when am I ever wrong?
For the sake of nostalgia it's a great trophy due to history attached to it. But until it has a Champions League spot for winning it, the FA Cup will continue to be very much secondary for any serious club around the top eight of English football.
If we won it this year, it'd be very, very surprised if the fixture congestion (with replays and all, you're looking at between eight to ten games potentially) didn't eliminate us from a serious chance of finishing 4th.
Look at Liverpool now. The sole reason why I'm 99% certain we'll finish comfortably above them is because the beauts still have the Europa League to contend with. They've played ten more competitive games than us already this season thanks to that crap competition that if you won only generates as much income as simply qualifying for the Champions League does.
I want Liverpool to progress as far as humanly possible in the FA and Europa League, because every game they play is like a shot in the heart of any chance of finishing 4th. Same with Tottenham, Arsenal, Chelsea... the lot of them. If Everton played 40 games flat (1 FA Cup 3rd Round defeat and 1 League Cup 2nd Round defeat) a season, and Liverpool/Spurs/Chelsea/Arsenal played close to or at the theoretical maximum of 81 games a season, I'd be over the moon.
Why put yourself in a sub-standard competition with depleting prestige and minimal prize money just to dent your chances of actually qualifying for the big time.
The FA Cup, League Cup and even the Europa League are the preserve of the Newcastles of this world. The smart club would jump out of the domestic cups at the first opportunity and, at best, compete in the Europa League ONLY if you were unfortunate enough to qualify for it.
Money talks in modern football - that's the be all, end all of the matter. I hate modern football, I wish we could go back to the romanticism of a "good old cup run" like in 1995, but those days are dead.
Erm, did you just say you'd be over the moon if Everton were knocked out of both cups in the first match ?
Yep. If it gave us a greater chance of being 4th, as it does this season.
If we had had our usual terrible start and were basically out of contention now, then I'd advocate a go at the FA Cup because you only start it in January.
But the League Cup can go to hell each and every year as far as I'm concerned.
PeterMeter
Player Valuation: £1m
As long as we have decent chances of finishing top 4, I'd hope that that would always be the focus of the squad. FA Cup, and especially the League Cup, should be used to rotate as much as possible. Good chances to air Mucha, Barkley, Duffy, Vellios and others and rest our aging squad of 30-plussers.
I'm astounded that you would be over the moon at Everton getting knocked out a cup competition at the first hurdle just so we had a better chance of getting 4th.
That's a world away from thinking finishing 4th is more worthwhile.
"Losing a battle to win the war".
The Playoff game for qualification to the Champions League proper is the real cup final for me. Not even a close call.
And when we finish 5th or get knocked out of the CL at the play offs and get nothing while those other clubs are counting their trophies?
I doubt a general would say he was over the moon that thousands of his men died in a battle because they won a war.
Arsed? Really?
I couldn't care less who wins the domestic cups this year. Chelsea won it last year and their fans haven't mentioned it once, nor have the media. The "prestige" of the domestic cups exists only in the mind of anyone over the age of 30 and the BBC because they have the rights to broadcast the game. Nobody else cares.
Portsmouth won it in 2008. Cardiff were the runners up. One of them is now basically dead and the other saw their promotion charge derailed for four years. You know who went up from the Championship that year? Stoke and West Brom. Cardiff finished 12th, six points off the playoffs after playing approximately 10 more games than their rivals.
Stoke and West Brom have enjoyed Premier League football ever since. What did getting to the cup final do for Cardiff? Diddly squat.
As I say, if they give a proper prize money fund to the FA Cup and/or a proper prize at the end of it in terms of Champions League qualification, then I'd care. But if we finish 4th and miss out in the playoffs for the Champions League, I'd still prefer that to an FA Cup final win.
Right or wrong, that's modern football.
Now you're just being deliberately weird.
Nope.
You said you would be over the moon at Everton losing a football match, then drew some weird comparison to war. While losing a battle might give you a strategic advantage and allow you to win the war, no general is going to be 'over the moon' about it.
Just like no Everton fan should be buzzing their tits off if we get knocked out of any competition.
And your assertion that 'nobody cares' about winning the League Cup, never mind the FA Cup, is an absurd and totally false one. You ask the fans at Wembley in 2009 if they were arsed about losing to Chelsea.
You ask the Liverpool fans how it felt to win all those domestic trophies while we won f*** all. Pretty sure they'd care.
Tell you what, actual come up with a counter argument or get lost lad, because that right there isn't debating, it's just pure sh*te
Tell me why the FA Cup/League Cup means anything and give examples as to why, there's a good chap.- Status
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