The League Cup, it’s in the game
Credit:
If you like watching your football in a spacious environment, troubled only by the presence
of a few die-hards, the odd curious passerby, and perhaps an occasional stray dog then
this coming Monday night is one that should be heavily circled on your kitchen calendar.
Forget the League, pay no attention to the painted whore that is the Setanta Cup, get out
your thermos flask and prepare for pure football, the League Cup is coming to town.
This coming week sees many clubs take their first steps in this year’s League Cup, or to give it its sponsored title, The EA Sports Cup. You may not have heard about this, it hasn’t exactly set the wires alight and hard info on fixtures and kick off times must be mined from the rockface. Which is a shame because there are those among us that would quite like to go to some of those games and it is my experience that the single biggest impediment to attending a football match is knowing when the bloody thing is on.
But just look at those fixtures, they are a thing of beauty. Galway United v Cockhill Celtic, now what's not to like about that? Sean Connor’s men are already struggling to keep their heads above water in the Airtricity league, so does he put out his best eleven in a competition that is, to haul out the small competition cliche, winnable? Or, sandwiched as it is between the league challenges of Bohemians and Sligo Rovers, does he trust in the economics of scale and send out his lesser lights, thus risking the infamy of defeat by a team with ‘cock’ in their title? I can see the headlines already!
Admittedly we are not great in number, but what we League Cup aficionados lack in quantity we more than make up for in eclectic quality. You see it takes a certain kind of person to see the appeal of a competition that is something of a raggedy orphan. It takes a person of imagination, someone with the courage to step out from the crowd. It takes a kind of visionary. Agoraphobics certainly need not apply.
After all, just how many forward thinking souls will be drawn to the clash of Tralee Dynamos and Waterford United? The public order contingent of the Tralee Gardai will hardly be planning through the night but consider the buzz for a group of local supporters who have been fed on a diet of A Championship football and who rarely get to sit down with league visitors. Consider also that the Blues beat Tralee 9-0 in last season’s competition with those who made the effort to attend rewarded by the sight of George O’Callaghan bagging five from midfield. How many saw that? And how many shameless spoofers now claim to have seen it?
I have to admit that I quite like that nobody else is interested. The League Cup’s lack of popular appeal lends it a certain mystique that my inner snob finds hard to resist. It’s somewhat facile being able to claim you were there when your team won the league. Of course you were, that’s hardly a boast now, is it? But how many of us can claim the moral high ground of having seen our heroes soundly beaten by FC Carlow? It is from raw experience such as this that the medals of footballing honour are cast.
Fans of Shelbourne will know what I mean, because that is precisely the atmosphere of jeopardy that surrounds their League Cup assignment this coming week. Many of them will already have visited County Carlow for the club’s Leinster Senior Cup outing against Crettyard United and those brave souls will be fully aware of the dangers posed in that corner of the world. Strong favourites to lift the First Division title they may be, but can they escape from this idiosyncratic little Cup with their dignity intact? Forza FC Carlow, as we might say if we were Italian. Which we’re not.
My own love affair with this competition began at the Final of the 1988 competition when Cork City beat Shamrock Rovers at a packed Turner’s Cross. It seems that the final is the standard entry point for the majority of League Cup visitors but my real appreciation of what it has to offer came in April 2009 when I went to see Athlone Town take on Longford Town in a first round game at Lisseywoollen.
I was standing alone behind one of the goals as Athlone took a corner kick. The ball sailed into the Longford box and, as I turned to follow its trajectory, I heard a dull splat as Athlone forward Stephen Place was dumped solidly into the turf by a rogue Longford elbow. The corner was then cleared and as Stephen extricated himself from the gluey surface both teams raced away up the pitch. As he rose the Athlone man looked around at the departing players and fixed me, the only remaining human, with a steely glare. “That was a penalty!”, he cried.
I couldn’t have agreed more and told him so. As he trotted away, muttering barely audible curses, I was left with the strong impression that I was now his mate and was bitterly disappointed that, when he subsequently scored later in the evening, I had removed myself to the stand and was no longer on hand to share the moment. Athlone ran out 3-0 winners on the night with two more goals from a young lad called Emika Onwubiko, (I wonder where he disappeared to?) and it is a result that I came away feeling part of in a way that no ‘big time Charlie’ league game can hope to offer.
This is the true magic of the League Cup. It operates in such rarified air, moves in such exclusive circles, that should you choose to become a part of it you might just be handed a starring role. Perhaps you will be the fan that some player recognises at a later date, “Isn’t that the nutter that was at the Carlow game?”. Or maybe you will find yourself present at a rare moment in history, “See that bloke over there? That’s Gerry, he was at the 15-0 against Castlebar. You know, the one when our ‘keeper got a hatrick and the ref scored with a thunderbolt from 30 yards”. Quite simply the land of the League Cup is where strange events meet strange people.
Finally, a word to our sponsors, EA Sports. They may find that they have been shamefully neglected in the above piece. This is not intended as a slight, but merely as recognition of the fact that the League Cup, to be appreciated in all its eccentric beauty, must be referred to in its purest form. But there is something deeply moving about a commercial organistion such as they having the authenticity to stump up for a competition that only the dedicated few will ever love. But how appropriate that this magnificent crucible of dreams should be supported by the makers of a game in which I once led Yeovil Town to Champions League glory.
The League Cup, it’s in the game.
Full list of next week's EA Sports Cup Fixtures
This coming week sees many clubs take their first steps in this year’s League Cup, or to give it its sponsored title, The EA Sports Cup. You may not have heard about this, it hasn’t exactly set the wires alight and hard info on fixtures and kick off times must be mined from the rockface. Which is a shame because there are those among us that would quite like to go to some of those games and it is my experience that the single biggest impediment to attending a football match is knowing when the bloody thing is on.
But just look at those fixtures, they are a thing of beauty. Galway United v Cockhill Celtic, now what's not to like about that? Sean Connor’s men are already struggling to keep their heads above water in the Airtricity league, so does he put out his best eleven in a competition that is, to haul out the small competition cliche, winnable? Or, sandwiched as it is between the league challenges of Bohemians and Sligo Rovers, does he trust in the economics of scale and send out his lesser lights, thus risking the infamy of defeat by a team with ‘cock’ in their title? I can see the headlines already!
Admittedly we are not great in number, but what we League Cup aficionados lack in quantity we more than make up for in eclectic quality. You see it takes a certain kind of person to see the appeal of a competition that is something of a raggedy orphan. It takes a person of imagination, someone with the courage to step out from the crowd. It takes a kind of visionary. Agoraphobics certainly need not apply.
After all, just how many forward thinking souls will be drawn to the clash of Tralee Dynamos and Waterford United? The public order contingent of the Tralee Gardai will hardly be planning through the night but consider the buzz for a group of local supporters who have been fed on a diet of A Championship football and who rarely get to sit down with league visitors. Consider also that the Blues beat Tralee 9-0 in last season’s competition with those who made the effort to attend rewarded by the sight of George O’Callaghan bagging five from midfield. How many saw that? And how many shameless spoofers now claim to have seen it?
I have to admit that I quite like that nobody else is interested. The League Cup’s lack of popular appeal lends it a certain mystique that my inner snob finds hard to resist. It’s somewhat facile being able to claim you were there when your team won the league. Of course you were, that’s hardly a boast now, is it? But how many of us can claim the moral high ground of having seen our heroes soundly beaten by FC Carlow? It is from raw experience such as this that the medals of footballing honour are cast.
Fans of Shelbourne will know what I mean, because that is precisely the atmosphere of jeopardy that surrounds their League Cup assignment this coming week. Many of them will already have visited County Carlow for the club’s Leinster Senior Cup outing against Crettyard United and those brave souls will be fully aware of the dangers posed in that corner of the world. Strong favourites to lift the First Division title they may be, but can they escape from this idiosyncratic little Cup with their dignity intact? Forza FC Carlow, as we might say if we were Italian. Which we’re not.
My own love affair with this competition began at the Final of the 1988 competition when Cork City beat Shamrock Rovers at a packed Turner’s Cross. It seems that the final is the standard entry point for the majority of League Cup visitors but my real appreciation of what it has to offer came in April 2009 when I went to see Athlone Town take on Longford Town in a first round game at Lisseywoollen.
I was standing alone behind one of the goals as Athlone took a corner kick. The ball sailed into the Longford box and, as I turned to follow its trajectory, I heard a dull splat as Athlone forward Stephen Place was dumped solidly into the turf by a rogue Longford elbow. The corner was then cleared and as Stephen extricated himself from the gluey surface both teams raced away up the pitch. As he rose the Athlone man looked around at the departing players and fixed me, the only remaining human, with a steely glare. “That was a penalty!”, he cried.
I couldn’t have agreed more and told him so. As he trotted away, muttering barely audible curses, I was left with the strong impression that I was now his mate and was bitterly disappointed that, when he subsequently scored later in the evening, I had removed myself to the stand and was no longer on hand to share the moment. Athlone ran out 3-0 winners on the night with two more goals from a young lad called Emika Onwubiko, (I wonder where he disappeared to?) and it is a result that I came away feeling part of in a way that no ‘big time Charlie’ league game can hope to offer.
This is the true magic of the League Cup. It operates in such rarified air, moves in such exclusive circles, that should you choose to become a part of it you might just be handed a starring role. Perhaps you will be the fan that some player recognises at a later date, “Isn’t that the nutter that was at the Carlow game?”. Or maybe you will find yourself present at a rare moment in history, “See that bloke over there? That’s Gerry, he was at the 15-0 against Castlebar. You know, the one when our ‘keeper got a hatrick and the ref scored with a thunderbolt from 30 yards”. Quite simply the land of the League Cup is where strange events meet strange people.
Finally, a word to our sponsors, EA Sports. They may find that they have been shamefully neglected in the above piece. This is not intended as a slight, but merely as recognition of the fact that the League Cup, to be appreciated in all its eccentric beauty, must be referred to in its purest form. But there is something deeply moving about a commercial organistion such as they having the authenticity to stump up for a competition that only the dedicated few will ever love. But how appropriate that this magnificent crucible of dreams should be supported by the makers of a game in which I once led Yeovil Town to Champions League glory.
The League Cup, it’s in the game.
Full list of next week's EA Sports Cup Fixtures
About Simon O'Gorman
Simon O'Gorman began reporting for Extratime in 2010. He remembers Milltown and Flower Lodge and, back in the mists of time, saw Diego Maradona play at Lansdowne Road. He now lives in Co Kildare and … View Full Profile